Star Trek: Odyssey
by 117Jorn
Summary: Odysseus spent ten years getting home. The crew of the Ra Cailum must go on a journey just as epic and extraordinary to return to their universe, but Starfleet's code to explore strange new worlds, seek out new life and new civilizations and boldly go where no one's gone before will make it an exciting trip.
1. Chapter 1

**Ron the True Fan: Does it look like we own Star Trek? Or STO? Or ANYTHING beyond the madness you're about to read? What's that? No? Then don't bother, lawyers!**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Now, this will be a little bit different from some of our other STO stories. Jorn's the one who had the idea, so I'll let him explain it if he wants.**

 **117Jorn: Basically, the focus is Star Trek, however this shall be crossing over a LOT of other series… I would explain more, but I shall not spoil more until you start reading! GO!**

 **San Francisco Shipyards, Earth Orbit**

" _Captain's Log, USS_ Ra-Cailum _, stardate 87359.3: the_ Ra-Cailum _has completed a three month refit following the Iconian War, and I'm finally getting her out of the dock. I'm pleased to report that all hands are eager to get the hell back into deep space, and my chief engineer's been wanting to test some new convoluted warp drive system. If my ship explodes… I blame her._ "

An _Odyssey_ -Class superdreadnought hung in her gantry near Earth Spacedock, swarmed by work bees. "Tis a glorious sight to behold. And she's all MINE."

Sonja Henderson rolled her eyes as her captain laughed manically. "Boss, you can quit with the evil routine. It stopped being funny five minutes ago."

"Aww, Sonja, can't you just enjoy the moment? This is the ship that ended the Iconian War."

"With a lot of hard work, guts, and plenty of just plain luck," another voice remarked as two people walked up to Sonja and the Captain. The speaker was a human male, around 25 years old, with dark brown hair done in a buzzcut, a bushy moustache in the same color as his hair, and violet eyes. With him was a human female, around the same age, with dark red hair that only fell to the nape of her neck, bluish-purple eyes, and an above-average bosom. Both were clad in the standard 'Odyssey' uniform Starfleet had adopted, the man with Commander's rank insignia while the woman had Lieutenant Commander's insignia. The man also had a katana sword strapped to his waist. Both also bore matching bands of gold on their right ring fingers.

"More like a temporal paradox. Now, let's see what those idiots have done to my engine room." The fourth-shortest person in the shuttlecraft _Ra-horakhty_ guided the shuttle into the main bay, planting it into the deck. "You're a horrible pilot."

"I can fly. I just can't land."

"Riza, you can't fly anything smaller than a _Dakota_ ," the man with the sword told her. "There's a reason they call you 'Riza, destroyer of shuttles', after all."

"Does 'shove it up your—'"

"RIZA!"

Riza looked at the man in the co-pilot's seat. "Yes, oni-sama?"

"Watch your language. My second-favorite person will be coming on board in a few hours as soon as Sonja makes her once-over. I will be cutting down on the cursing, too, so that means you, too."

"Still a little surprised you agreed to let Larcei come along," the man with the sword admitted. "Given your policy about starships and kids, after all."

"I spent three months on Earth babysitting her. And the look she gave me was enough to kill a bloodthirsty Klingon when I said she couldn't come with us."

"She guilt-tripped you?" the woman next to the man with the sword asked. "I didn't think that was possible, seeing as Admiral Quinn couldn't do it."

"Never underestimate the pout of a three-year old girl, Luna. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to reconnect with the ship's computer network. If those idiots screwed up the leads, I'm going to make heads roll. Literally."

"Understood, boss," the man with the sword replied. "Luna and I will make sure our room's ready for Larcei."

On the bridge, which was a lot more closed in compared to most _Odyssey_ -Class ships (per the captain's request, as he found the bridge of a stock Oddy too agoraphobic) Corpsa zh'Kilon worked furiously to get the setup she had BEFORE the refit back up. "Bloody spacedock engineers. They always think their way's the best way."

"Could be worse, ma'am, they could've torn the ship apart looking for—"

"Finish that sentence, Kim, and I will challenge you to a ushaan!"

Lieutenant Kimberly "Kim" Johnston wisely shut up.

The turbolift doors opened, revealing their captain, Ronald Pinkerton, and his XO, Takeshi Yamato. "Captain on deck!"

"Corpy, I don't stand on ceremony. As you were, people! We've got work to do, and we're not getting to it in spacedock!

Everyone scrambled to secure themselves to anything bolted to the deck.

"Oh, COME ON! Departures are never that bad!"

"You tell your sister to take us out at full impulse! Towards traffic!"

"Eh, we always dodge them."

As Takeshi sat in the XO's seat and pulled on his safety harness, he said, "And that tends to strain the inertial dampeners a bit, boss."

Ron sat down in his chair as his sister entered the bridge. "We'll be fine. Departure stations! Kim, get me the dock master."

"Control tower reading, Captain."

Ron smirked as he leaned back. "ESD, this is _Ra Cailum_ Actual. Request permission to depart."

"This is control, _Ra Cailum_ : permission granted. All moorings are cleared." Riza tapped the controls to get the ship moving. "Aft thrusters, then punch it up to full impulse."

Takeshi just hit a control on his armrest, sending an automated message to all other decks for all hands to secure safety restraints, before he braced for the inevitable ride. Down in the quarters he shared with Luna, the redhead had already strapped in, and was holding their three-year-old daughter tightly in her lap.

The Oddy exited the dock smoothly, much smoother then Luna could remember. "I guess Riza wants to give your first time out of spacedock a smooth ride."

On the bridge, Ron leaned to rest his head on his left hand. "Riza, punch it!" The _Ra Cailum_ shot forward like an arrow shot from the bow, shooting toward the USS _Izumo_. "Roll over and let's give those cadets the bricking of their lives!"

As the ship suddenly accelerated and rolled, Luna made sure to keep her grip on her daughter tight. "Then again, maybe she was just warming up a bit there," she admitted.

The ship got within five meters of the bridge, the saucer barely missing the command center. "Izumo _to Pinkerton: you REALLY enjoy scaring my cadets._ "

"Think of it as extra training, Nano! To get that close, you must master your fear! Riza! Take us out!"

"Copy that. Prepare for warp speed!"

As they leveled out, Takeshi breathed a bit of a sigh of relief. Usually getting clear of the traffic was the hardest part, so it should be smooth sailing from there… though he didn't say that out loud, for fear of jinxing it.

The Oddy inverted, then, as soon as she was clear of Luna, jumped to warp speed in a flash of Cherenkov particles.

The senior staff waited in the briefing room, looking right at the painting Riza made of the original Ra-Cailum, flying as though a ghost behind and above the one they were currently on board.

"So, what's the meeting about?"

"It's Sonja's job to tell us. It involves the SCE."

The doors opened, and Sonja ran in carrying a half-dozen PADDs. "Sorry I'm late, had to get all the data for the meeting."

"No worries, Sonja," Takeshi replied. "So, what's up?"

She pasted the PADDs around. "Any of you remember Kosinski?"

"That half-baked jackass whose assistant sent the D to the edge of the universe? Hard to forget."

"Right. Command wants us to test some of his viable calculations in conjunction with the warp ten system Voyager brought back."

No one looked happy about that. "Didn't that shit turn Paris into—"

"Don't go there, boss," Takeshi interrupted. "So… we're basically testing some improvements to the warp drive?"

"More or less. I'll be overseeing the modifications, and if they work, we'll be able to add the enhanced warp drive to our list of FTL: warp drive, quantum slipstream and that transwarp system we… recovered from that Voth ship." Ron and Takeshi smirked at the reminder of how they got that Voth scout ship and its' all-important transwarp drive.

"Begin the modifications. Now, if you excuse me, I'd like to see my niece."

They all nodded, and Takeshi, Luna, and Ron all left, heading for Takeshi and Luna's quarters.

"You consider her your niece?" Luna asked.

"I asked Take to name me her godfather at the Academy. The exact words were 'if he had any kids, I'm the godfather', but the point remains."

Larcei had never been in space before. The sight of all the stars shooting past was mesmerizing. "Pretty."

"That's not the only pretty thing!"

Larcei turned around, seeing her parents and her favorite uncle. "Uncle Ronnie!"

"Hey there, musume," Takeshi said. "You enjoying your first actual trip into space?"

"You bet, Tou-san!" Larcei replied. "The stars are so pretty out here, even more so than on Earth, or even on the station!"

"You know what, little one? Guess what?"

Larcei looked to her uncle. "What?"

"You're coming to the bridge! Wanna take the helm with Aunty Riza?"

Her eyes lit up. "Yay! Can I come, tou-san?"

Takeshi nodded. "Sure, why not?" he said. He hoped Ron knew what he was doing, but couldn't really say as much when both Ron and Larcei were right there.

"I'll talk to Sonja and see how that warp drive's coming along," Luna whispered to him. "You and Ron take Larcei to the bridge."

"You don't trust Ron?" Takeshi asked in a similar whisper.

"It's _Ron_ ," Luna reminded. "Remember the time when you gave him a phaser pistol and it came back as an overpowered weapon of mass destruction?"

Takeshi shuddered a bit. "Don't remind me," he told her.

Main engineering was a mess.

On the _Ra Cailum_ , this was normal. But THIS was just wrong. "I am going to KILL those morons at ESD! I expected my engine room to be the same way I LEFT it! Look at this mess!"

"It could be worse, Sonja." The hispanic Mirror Universe woman glanced over her shoulder to find Lunamaria standing at the threshold of main engineering. "It could be not here."

"Don't give me that image, Luna. I thought you were with Larcei."

"Ron and Takeshi are taking her up to the bridge," Luna replied. "Ron's idea."

"That won't end well."

"Most of Ron's ideas never do, although usually they never end well for someone else. Although that stunt we pulled with the _Laevhal_ cost us the original _Ra Cailum_. What gave him the idea to ram it?"

Sonja smirked as she kicked the new warp core. "The Kobayashi Maru, according to his personal log."

Luna stared at her. "You hacked into his personal logs?"

"Sure. don't you?"

"For one thing, hacking is Rina's thing, not mine," Luna replied. "Second, isn't that, I don't know, an invasion of privacy?"

Sonja shrugged, picking up a hyperspanner. "Does it look like Ron _cares_?"

"…you have a point. How's that warp core?"

"Modifications are complete. We should be able to jump into warp at the boss' order to test the insanity drive."

"Knowing Ron, he'll let Larcei push the button."

"You're seriously going to let her push the button?" Takeshi whispered to Ron.

"If she follows in your footsteps, she'll be pushing LOTS of buttons. I'm just going to be the one to let her push her first."

"...You can be unnecessarily creepy at times."

"Eh, Larcei loves it."

The young girl was sitting in Riza's lap, marveling at all the buttons.

"She doesn't even understand half the crap you pull!"

"Corrupt 'em young, that's what my mom used to say."

Takeshi sighed. "You have a seriously crazy family," he said.

"Well, I learned to beat the snot out of godlike beings from her."

Takeshi facepalmed as Sonja and Luna came onto the bridge. "Everything's ready to go, boss man! Push the button and this tub of shi—"

Ron glared at Sonja before pointing at Larcei, which shut her up.

"Whoops. I thought you had a no kids on my ship policy."

"Larcei's an exception. Speaking of which… Oh, Larcei?"

Larcei smiled. "Right, Uncle Ronnie!" she said, before pressing the button.

The _Ra Cailum_ jumped into what would later be called Ludicrous Speed. The ship began to shake before Ron looked to Sonja before ushering Larcei to his ready room and sealing it. Takeshi covered his ears. "SONJA!"

Luna looked at the viewscreen, and pointed. "Wormhole!" she called out, and indeed, it seemed like one was opening up right in front of them.

"What the hell?!"

"You idiot! You imbalanced the warp engines and now we're pullin' a 2273 Enterprise!" Ron looked to Corpsa as vision distorted. "Arm photon torpedoes!"

"Here's hoping it works this time, too!" Takeshi yelled, bracing for the inevitable impact.

The Andorian armed the torpedoes, then fired the two projectiles. The captain's eyes widened as he realized a mistake. "CORPSA, NO!" Too little. Too late. The torpedoes exploded, and all went white.

 **117Jorn: And here we go! The prologue to a story which shall SPAN THE MULTIVERSE!**

 **Ron the True Fan: I blame the influence of Take, here. If you've read Archangel's Amazing Adventures… He betas it. …Not complaining, I'm looking forward to this INSANITY.**

 **Takeshi Yamato: We won't be touching any series that AAA visits, though - we want to be somewhat original here. We may hit other entries in some of the franchises he's visited, but never any specific entries. So, for example, Final Fantasy VI is out because AAA went there, but any other entry in the Final Fantasy series would be fair game.**

 **117Jorn: Prepare for a lot of crazy-ass tales to be told! And next week we start this epic journey. What will be the first series to cross over? Find out in the next installment of STAR TREK ODYSSEY!**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**


	2. Chapter 2

**117jorn: Hey everyone! Another week, another update for the Odyssey!**

* * *

 **August 30th, 2553 AD, Epsilon Eridani System**

 **Reach, Aszod Ship Breaking Yard,**

* * *

"Give'em hell… Six… "

Noble Six watched as Emile fell silent, his body limp as the SPARTAN III finally succumbed to his wounds battling the Elite Zealot's. Spartan B312 allowed a moment of silence, as the moment sunk in.

They had did it, they completed the mission. The package from Dr. Halsey was safely aboard the UNSC _Pillar of Autumn_ , he could still see the lone _Halcyon_ -class Light Cruiser fly away in the distance, moving as fast as it could out of Reach's atmosphere, as the _CCS_ -class Battlecruiser, damaged by the MAC blast Noble Six had fired earlier, attempting to give chase to the vessel, but it wouldn't catch up before it entered Slipspace.

They had done it… and all it took was his entire squad.

" _Tell them to make it count._ "

…did he? Did they make it count? Did six make it count? He kept thinking about it, but the more he did the more he didn't think they did. The Covenant won, there was no way to dispute that. The fleet put up a good fight, but in the end they were crushed by the Covenant's superior technology and numbers. While they were able to fight them fairly well on the ground, it meant little now as covenant ships were already starting to glass the planet… glass Jorge's home, the home of all SPARTAN-II's.

Noble Six didn't owe Reach anything… nothing emotional like Jorge did. He was raised on Onyx, after his family died when his homeworld was glassed by the Covenant a long time ago. His only connection to Reach was the fact it was the UNSC's fortress world, their last bastion to defend the inner colonies, and Earth's doorstep.

And now it had fallen.

The odds of Six getting off of Reach were almost non-existent, _Autumn_ was the last ship leaving. And now… he was all alone.

" _Leave that lone wolf stuff behind…_ "

Six chuckled bitterly, as he picked up Emile's Kukri knife, his last gift to him before passing on. As he attached it to his own shoulder piece, he looked at the dog tags he had clipped to his side, with the names of all of his comrades… save for Jun, who he hoped was somehow still alive… maybe he'll get off Reach.

But SPARTAN Jaden-B312 wasn't leaving Reach… he knew that for certain. ' _Looks like I'm going lone wolf one last time…_ ' he thought, as he looked at the wrist-mounted GPS, as he homed in on the signal for the final rally point for any surviving SPARTANs, Rally Point Omega.

He hesitated for a brief moment, though. Should he go to the rally point? With other Spartans? Other Teams? Would they even _want_ 'the Grim Reaper' with them?

' _We're all gonna die eventually…_ ' He thought, sighing as he hefted his MA37, before leaping down the catwalk, following the GPS coordinates towards the final Rally point… and likely his grave.

* * *

 **Meanwhile - Elsewhere**

 **Several dozen light years from Epsilon Eridani**

* * *

"I! HATE! WORMHOLES!" The _Ra Cailum_ fell out of the wormhole, many people falling on their asses. "Well. We're out of it, at least." Ron climbed back into his chair. "Damage report!" "Superficial, sir. A few busted EPS relays, but nothing we can't fix."

"I'm going to KILL Admiral Gardner for this. Find out where we are and contact Starfleet Command! Someone is going to PAY for this shit."

The door to Ron's ready room beeped and opened, where Larcei ran out, crying.

Takeshi and Luna were at Larcei's side in an instant, a small group hug forming as they comforted their daughter. "Shh…" Takeshi whispered. "It's all right now, musume… everything's going to be alright…"

"The lights were scary…"

"Ok, NOW I'm going to do unspeakable things to Gardner. No one scares my niece and gets away with it."

Corpsa and Kim glanced at one another before they looked to the captain. "Sir—"

"LATER. Take, take Larcei back to your quarters; we'll talk later. Your daughter's more important."

"Right," Takeshi replied, as he headed for the turbolifts, Luna following as she carried Larcei in her arms.

"I didn't know you cared that much."

"Larcei is family. You know my family's stance on that by now, Corpy. Fuck with my family, _you fuck with me_. And what happens _when you fuck with me_?"

"You blow the offending party to pieces, sir," Kim replied. "Unfortunately, we've got a bit of a problem. According to our sensors, we're a few light years from the Epsilon Eridani system, but the stars aren't right."

"Stellar drift. Make the calculations: when are we?"

"Sir, you're connected to the ship's computer."

"I don't want to make you feel useless, people. What's the date?" Kim and Corpsa looked to one another as the latter fed star patterns to the former's station. "According to the computer…" The Andorian paused, before her eyes widened. "It's… roughly 2551. We're over 150 years in the future."

"Lovely." Ron groaned, "Set a course for Starbase 3: it's at Epsilon Eridani."

"Setting course."

"Warp two. Engage." The _Ra-Cailum_ turned toward the star, jumping to low warp.

* * *

 **Epsilon Eridani - Reach**

 **Rally Point Omega**

* * *

By the time Jaden had arrived, it looked like he had just missed the real battle.

As he stepped off of the Mongoose he used to get there, he found the ground was already littered with bodies. A number of Covenant elites and grunts were scattered around, but also were thirteen Spartans, and a handful of marines… all died, fighting a battle they knew they couldn't win.

' _Looks like I'm about to join them…_ ' He thought, as he could already make out Covenant Dropships in the distance. It wouldn't be long before they found him, so it left him with little time to prepare, with what little weapons he had available. He found a few scattered assault rifles, DMR's and pistols, a shotgun with a few shells left, a handful of grenades, a pair of mounted HMG's, and a SPARTAN Laser with a few shots left in her.

Anything after that… Well, he'll improvise. Covies won't need their guns when their nothing but messes on the dirt.

Six stood on the elevated concrete platform, as he glanced at the batch of Dogtags he had gathered from the fallen soldiers around him. He had considered not even bothering retreating them, since there was no way in hell _he_ was getting out of here alive… But he felt it was the least he could do for his fallen brothers and sisters.

He watched as the first Phantom Dropship closed in, landing a klick away as it unloaded a troop of Grunts and Jackals. ' _Time to dance,_ ' Jaden thought, as he pulled up the first HMG… And opened fire.

* * *

 **Meanwhile - USS _Ra Cailum_**

* * *

Takeshi and Luna had just finished tucking Larcei into bed, and the two were now sitting at the table in their quarters, as they mused on the situation, Ron having given them a brief message as to what was up.

"A hundred and fifty years…" Takeshi muttered. "Can't believe that one little mishap threw us so far into the future… I mean, I know Slingshots can cover that distance and more, but this wasn't a slingshot."

"The Bajoran wormhole pulled the same thing with the 2800."

"Correct me if I'm wrong, Luna, but didn't Ron chew the Prophets to hell for that screw up?"

"Yes, he did. Apparently the threat of having a chroniton beam shot into the wormhole was enough for them to go 'yes, the next time someone asks for a favor, we're going to ask for specifics'. Gotta love the fact that Ron's family is used to dealing with godlike beings." His mother was known to beat the crap out of Q, and it was rumored that in the 23rd Century, one of his relatives beat the shit out of an Organian.

Takeshi was of the opinion that his family was composed of insanity magnets.

This was not proving him wrong.

"Well, anyway, hopefully at Eridani we can figure out what happened and find a way to go back," he finally said after a moment.

"They might not let us. The Temporal Prime directive—"

"Ron'll get us back. Since when has he let us down before?"

Luna wanted to name many occasions, but she couldn't name one time where he let them down when they needed him most. "Ok, then. He'll get us back."

" _All senior staff, report to the bridge. We have a problem. And yes, Takeshi, that includes you and my practically-sister, so get your pants back on and GET BACK UP HERE!_ "

Takeshi groaned. "Why does he always assume that he's always going to interrupt us when doing _that_?" he asked. "I mean, yeah, part of me was… thinking about doing that, but we weren't there yet, and it's not like we're doing it every time he needs us…"

"Well, how many times has he walked in on us?" Takeshi had no retort, as his wife was right. Ron had poor timing in regards to their… activities. If it wasn't at the Academy, it was on board the original Ra-Cailum after he was rescued at Vega colony.

"Come on, let's go see what El Capitan wants."

* * *

"At least your pants are properly fit this time."

Luna raised an eyebrow at Ron's comment. "You always assume we're having sex, aren't you?"

"I have a running tally of the times I walked in on you at the Academy and on both ships under my command. It _exceeds **three digits**_."

"Enough, Ron," Takeshi said. "What's the problem?"

"As we both know, we're in the 26th century and deep in Federation space."

"And?"

"There's complete silence on subspace. NOTHING. In fact, the closest we've got to subspace comms is on board this ship!"

Takeshi blinked. "Huh," he said. "That **_is_** a problem. Because that would mean either something happened to disrupt subspace comms…" He then sighed. "…or we've jumped dimensions."

" _Universes_ , Take. I had to correct you WAY too many times at the Academy because you kept mixing the two up."

"What's the difference?"

Ron shrugged. "One is infinite, the other isn't. Point is, I'm stopping the ship and sending the _Firestorm_ to investigate. If I don't hear from you in six hours, I'm bringing the _Ra-Cailum_ in. You've been clamoring at a chance to fly that thing after Sonja finished her refit, so here's the perfect excuse."

Takeshi grinned. "Thanks, Ron!" he said.

"Try not to wreck it."

"I'm not your sister, Ron."

"Hey!"

* * *

The _Firestorm_ was the _Aquarius_ from hell. Refit to standards above and beyond any of her sisters, including a phase shift cloaking device akin to the one used by the USS _Pegasus_ and the very limited use Romulan Shadow-Class science ships, the _Firestorm_ rivaled the firepower of a _Mercury_ -Class escort.

And it wasn't very often that Takeshi got to fly the thing. He was glad that he could, though - honestly, he was sorta like Riza's opposite. Riza was an exceptional pilot for big ships, but she broke anything smaller than a Heavy Cruiser, as they just weren't strong enough for her hand. Takeshi, on the other hand, was only mediocre at helming the larger ships, but when it came to the smaller ones, he could make them **_dance_**.

" _Docking clamps are unlocked. Now, don't accelerate out too fast. You break that thing, Luna's not going to be the only one who has your ass_."

"What is it with this crew and the sex cracks?"

" _Because whenever you're not taking care of your kid or dealing with life, you're screwing each other!_ "

Takeshi's bridge crew took the opportunity to have a laugh at Takeshi and Luna's expense.

"Yeah, yeah, laugh it up," Takeshi growled, Luna just blushing over at her station. "We're heading out now."

With that, Takeshi began easing the _Firestorm_ out of its alcove.

Once the ship was fifteen meters out of the port, Takeshi pulled up, firing the impulse engines to fly over the saucer section. Unlike the crew on the _Izumo_ , no one even blinked.

"Do it again, tou-san! Do it again!"

Takeshi blinked. "Larcei?" he asked, seeing his daughter on the _Firestorm_ 's bridge. "How did you-?"

"I pushed a lot of buttons! Aunty Sonja showed me!" Takeshi stared at his daughter.

Then he pulled what Ron usually pulled, and what everyone else called the 'Sonja Yell'.

"SONJA!"

Luna just facepalmed. "Musume, _why_ are you here?" she asked. "We're going into something potentially dangerous right now… it would be safer for you to have stayed in our quarters on the _Ra Cailum_."

"But I thought it was safest with you." Child logic at its' finest: there's no place safer than with mommy and daddy.

On the other hand, they were on a starship fit with a phase shift cloaking device and enough pulse cannons to glass a small moon. "We could have Ron beam her back."

"You know what he'll say, Luna."

* * *

"I am not beaming her back here. The last time we did that, she puked."

" _She was less than a year old! Toddlers do that!_ "

Ron's face was as stone as he argued with the parents. "Look, I do not want a repeat of what happened last time. You've got a babysitter in sickbay; put her there for now! I'll send the _Isis_ to pick her up once you've determined what's going on."

Takeshi sighed. " _Alright, Ron, alright,_ " he said. " _But when I get back, I'm going to…_ voice my displeasure _with Sonja for helping Larcei get on here._ "

"I'll get her ready for you. Pinkerton out." The comm cut before Ron spun his chair around to face Sonja's engineering station and took in a **_very_** deep breath.

" ** _SONJA!_** "

"Uh-oh."

* * *

 **Meanwhile - Reach**

 **Rally Point Omega**

* * *

 **BGM: "Where Heroes Fell" by Really Slow Motion**

"FUCK OFF" Six shouted as he pulled the trigger to the SPARTAN laser, as the bright red beam of energy arcing forward and slamming into the Wraith tank. The Covenant tank bursting into a ball of blue flames, but Jaden didn't have time to celebrate before he discarded the spent laser, and ducked and rolled, narrowly avoiding being cut in half by an Elite Major's energy sword. He quickly leaped back to his feet, spinning around as he pulled up his M45 Shotgun as the Elite charged at him again - only to get blown away with a face full of 8 Gauge pellets.

Jaden wished he knew how much time had passed since the battle began - after a needler round hit the corner of his visor knocking out his clock and motion tracker. A minor inconvenience.

He didn't waste another second as he sprinted towards the concrete shed, leaping over the rubble as he encountered his next target: An Elite minor with a Concussion Rifle. The Covenant warrior roared as it brought the weapon to bear, but didn't move fast enough as Six kicked the weapon out of his grasp, before firing his shotgun yet again. The distance he shot it from didn't kill the Elite, but it killed his shields, allowing him to throw Emile's knife, the blade hitting the alien square in the head, as it fell back dead.

Suddenly, another Elite - an Ultra - leaped into the room wielding an energy sword. Jaden brought his shotgun to bear to shoot once more, only to growl when it made the infamous 'click' sound of a gun out of ammo. As the Elite charged at him, Jaden held his empty shotgun by the barrel and ducked under the strike, before he used the weapon as a bat as he hit the Elite's chest, knocking the wind out of the creature. He didn't stop there as he swung the Shotgun again, this time into the back of the Elite knocking him down to the ground, and hitting him one last time in the back of the head for good measure.

With the Elite dead, he tossed the useless shotgun away, and ran to where Emile's knife remained embedded in the last Elite, yanking it out, and putting it back in its holster. He headed out of the shed, and a fuel rod blast impacted narrowly to his left, not hitting him, but he could still feel the heat from the blast, and the force sent him flying a few feet - and his visor was cracked right in the center, as all pieces of equipment ceased working.

Jaden cursed, as he took his useless helmet off, the cracks being more of a distraction now than anything. His skin was finally exposed to the hot air around him, from the glassing, from all the plasma flying around, he didn't know or care. His black hair drenched in sweat, and his crimson red eye narrowed, as another Elite Ultra fired a plasma rifle at him, dashing towards him.

He grabbed an MA37 by his feet, he picked the weapon up as he fired the weapon at the Ultra - taking up half the clip to kill its shields, and end the Alien. However he heard growling behind him, and spun around just in time to shove the butt of his rifle into the head of a golden-armored Elite with an energy sword. The force sent the General back to the ground, and while he was down Six picked out his M6G and fired two shots into his head.

However he didn't have much time before another Elite fired a plasma repeater at him, as he returned fire with his own rifle. However a Second elite joined in, firing his own rifle - killing his shields and impacting against his right flank. He yelled in pain, but did not stop fighting as he pulled out his pistol and fired both weapons at once, killing both Elites in a hail of gunfire. But while he stopped them, a third Elite charged at him - this one wearing white armor as he punched Jaden - who went flying back.

The Elite was on top of him moments later, an Energy dagger ready to finish him off, but Jaden kicked the Elite back, forcing him back a few feet - only for a Zealot to take his place. But Jaden was quick as he slapped the Zealot's energy sword away, before kicking him in the face. However the white armored Elite had recovered and attempted to strike him down once more, but Jaden drew out his old combat knife, and drove it deep within his skull, killing it - but the Zealot came back, and stabbed Jaden in his right thigh.

Jaden howled in pain as he tried to turn around, only for the Zealot to pin him down to the ground - as another Elite approached, with an energy sword drawn, this one wearing similarly white armor. The Elite just looked down at Six, before glancing around - looking at the near countless bodies of his fallen brothers, among the other dead Grunts, Jackals, and Hunters.

"...You fight well, Demon." Jaden did a double-take, did that split-face just talk _english_? "I have heard rumors of warriors such as you… but I thought them exaggerated… until now."

The Elite circled Jaden and the Zealot "You killed some of our best Zealots, you participated in the destruction of the _Long Night of Solace_ , causing the death of Supreme Commander Rho 'Barutamee, and killed Field Marshall Seh 'Creckaee… and now, all this..." he gestured to the fields of death around them. "If anything, you fail to disappoint Demon… fighting to your very last moments… you would've made a fine Sangheili warrior."

"Fuck… You!" Jaden spat, as the Zealot growled, raising his dagger, but the Elite rose his hand, stopping him from striking. The Elite turned back to Jaden.

"Tell me, Demon… " He spoke, kneeling down. "What is your name?"

"What's it to you?" Jaden growled out, "You're going to kill me anyways."

"Yes," The Elite nodded, "But… I believe you are worthy of being remembered - from one warrior, to another… My name is Rtas Vadum, Special Operations Commander of the Fleet of Particular Justice… and you?"

Jaden still glared at the Elite… but decided, what the hell? "...Lieutenant Jaden-B312, Noble Six of SPARTAN Team Noble." He answered.

"Noble… fitting, I suppose." Rtas nodded, as he raised his blade "I give you rest, Jaden-B312, and I pray the gods share you mercy on the great journey."

' _I'm an Atheist, split-lip._ ' Jaden thought, as he awaited for his death… to finally join the rest of Noble team…

…but Death did not come, instead there was the sound of weapons fire, and Rtas was forced to duck as several objects flew overhead - hitting the Zealot who had restrained him in the head, killing him.

"What the-" Jaden asked, as he spared a glance to look for the source, those were _not_ UNSC weapons. Those were Covenant weapons, specifically Spike Rifles used by…

Brutes.

And sure enough, approaching the Rally point was a whole pack of Brutes, lead by a pair of Chieftains. The leading one wearing bright red/orange armor. The Brute chuckled, hefting up his Gravity Hammer. "We'll be taking that Demon, R'tas."

R'tas growled. "Goliath!" he shouted. "What is this heresy?!"

"Like we would let the Sangheili have the glory of killing _that_ Demon?" The Brute - 'Goliath' informed, before he snarled. "My pack mate was killed by that Demon in the glassed city, and we _will_ have our vengeance!"

"The Demon is mine," R'tas shouted back. "The Hierarchs will not tolerate this!"

Goalith chuckled. "They won't… if you die." He said, before letting out a war cry as the Brute's all charged at him.

R'Tas growled, as he was forced to fall back, as more of his own troops moved in - while Noble Six quickly crawled away, ducking for cover in a shed. Jaden soon found himself caught between Elites on one side, and Brutes on the other. On the plus side, his enemies were killing one another. On the bad side… they were all going to try and kill him.

…why did the Master Chief get all the _good_ luck?

* * *

 **Meanwhile - USS _Firestorm_**

 **En-route to Epsilon Eridani**

* * *

The Firestorm entered the Eridani system proper, dropping to impulse and engaging her cloaking device. "This is odd. I'm getting short range subspace radio traffic, but it's all on the ultra-low band, plus there's too much regular radio traffic. Something is very wrong, Commander."

"Alternate universe, most likely, then," Takeshi remarked. "Too many differences for it to be anything else. Kim, anything on the scanners yet?"

"…A lot."

"Define a lot."

"I'm picking up an entire fleet of ships, all of non-standard design. Most of them are firing at the surface." General Order 24: the complete destruction of all things on the surface of a planet. A last resort Starfleet knew would be used one day. But only as a last resort.

"OK, something's definitely not right here," Takeshi announced. "Yellow alert, be prepared for anything. I'm taking us in closer."

The _Firestorm_ approached Epsilon Eridani 3, and they were greeted with a horrifying sight. Hundreds of pieces of ship, all made of a titanium alloy and human-designed, and a massive fleet of alien warships, ranging in size from a ship the size of a Galaxy to one five times the size of the _Ra-Cailum_. And they were firing at the planet… Which looked more like a fireball than a planet.

In their universe, Starbase Three occupied this planet, guarded by a _Mauritania_ -Class starbase and supporting the sixth largest yards in Federation space.

"Something is very wrong here," Takeshi announced. "Rina, I want you to send a message to the _Ra Cailum_ , text only, telling Ron about what's going on here. Once you're done with that, try to hack into the systems of those alien ships. I want to know who they are, and why they're basically burning the planet."

"Yessir," Rina Nuras, the Bajoran at communications, replied as Takeshi started bringing the ship into a low orbit.

The Firestorm made a low pass near one of the ships, and Kim began scanning the vessel. "None of these lifesigns appear to match standard humanoid signatures. One appears to be a methane-breathing arthropod."

"That's not unusual."

"The sheer numbers are. And I'm picking up radio comms traffic on the other side of the planet."

"On speakers," Takeshi ordered.

" _…Goddamned Covvie bastards!_ "

"… _They've breached… Not gonna-_ "

" _…here are people down here!_ "

The messages kept coming, one after another, terrified human voices pleading for help, for mercy… But the alien ships seemed to ignore each and every last one. Through all of the panicked chatter though, Kim picked up another transmission, coming from one of the ships burning the planet, and was heard across all speakers.

" _Through war we will teach your heresy. Through battle we will teach your frailty. Through death we will teach your fate. Your destruction is the will of the Gods, And we are their Instrument!_ "

And that told Takeshi all he needed to know about the aliens and their purpose. "Genocidal religious fanatics…" he growled. "And I thought Pah-Wraith Cultists were bad. Rina? Get that information to Ron."

"Sending message now. You know what he's going to do."

"What he always does to genocidal madmen and races: wipe them out."

Ron had a bad history with genocide. They blamed it on the Borg; those assholes were living genocide. Of course, he didn't hurt the innocent. Just the ones that did.

* * *

The silence on the bridge was deafening. The crew wanted nothing to do with the yell that was no doubt ready to come from their mad captain's mouth.

They got the intel seconds ago, and they knew what happened the last time they dealt with the Elachi.

He killed them. All of them. With his sword.

He wasn't Takeshi; he didn't do 'sword'.

But when it came to genocidal whatevers, he actually agreed with one of those many Maxims his XO loved to recite.

Specifically, Maxim 37: There is no 'Overkill', only 'Open Fire' and 'I need to reload'.

"Riza, set a course for Epsilon Eridani Three. Maximum warp."

The younger sibling obeyed her brother's commands before he stood up. "I do not like bullies. I do not like mass murderers. And when it doesn't say anything about peace, love and understanding, religion is at the absolute TOP OF MY SHIT LIST!" Ron marched to a weapons locker, getting his compression rifle. "As such, time to have ourselves a crusade. If anyone has a problem with this, say so now; it will be noted in my log."

There was silence for about a moment, before another member of the bridge crew looked around, then at Ron, and said, "Sir, I think I speak for all of us here, when I say… Let's kill 'em all and count the bodies."

"Very well. All hands, stand to battle stations!"

The _Ra Cailum_ jumped to warp, turning invisible as it did so.

* * *

Jaden never liked being the center of attention, but _this_ was getting ridiculous. What started off as what he _thought_ would be his last stand against the Covenant, evolved into an all-out free-for-all between the Elites lead by the white elite 'Rtas', and the Brutes lead by 'Goliath', all of them gunning for the right to kill _him_ first.

Noble Six wasn't in his best shape - he stuck some Bio foam into his wounded leg and side, but that was a temporary solution to a minor problem. Using a Plasma Repeater he obtained from a fallen Elite, he was forced to begin fighting against the incoming Covenant. Deciding to focus on the Brutes - deciding if he was going to die, better at the hands of the Elites. At least they'd make the Death quick.

He fired the Repeater at an incoming Brute Minor, the unshielded ape took the plasma head on, and to its credit kept on charging until he was brought down for good. Jaden ran forward and picked up its weapon - the signature "Brute Shot" Grenade Launcher, and proceeded to open fire with it against the incoming apes - and any Elites who tried to take a shot at him.

' _The enemy of my enemy, is just my other enemy._ ' He thought with a bit of amusement, as one Brute jumped at him, but Six spun the Brute Shot around, and impaled the Brute on the large knife segment of the weapon. He then yanked it out, and fired what was left of the grenade launcher's ammo into a Brute Major that shot its Spiker at him, turning him into nothing more than a pile of flesh and bones.

However, he then heard another loud roar, and look just in time to see the Brute Chieftain from earlier charge towards him - Gravity Hammer in hand. "You are MINE DEMON!" H roared out, leaping up in the air to slam his hammer down.

Jaden had little time, but made use of it as he leaped out of the way, jumping out just in time to avoid being turned into paste on the ground s the gravity hammer slammed down, forming a small crater where it impacted. The Brute then swung the weapon around to hit Six with the blade portion, but the SPARTAN-III leaped up to dodge, as he tried to gain some distance, but the Brute continued to chase.

But to Jaden, it was clear that his time was coming to its end. Brute or Elite… this was where he was going to die, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

As he fought the Chieftain though, neither he, the Brutes or Elites knew that at that moment… they _were_ being watched from afar…

* * *

 **Meanwhile - USS _Firestorm_**

 **Geosynchronous orbit over Rally Point Omega**

* * *

"OK, that is weird," Takeshi remarked, as they all saw one human fighting off a bunch of aliens… even as the aliens fought _each other_. "Rina, are there any comm transmissions coming from that area?"

"Several, actually," Rina informed. "I'm… having a hard time believing some of them though…"

"How so?" Luna asked.

"The Ape-like aliens… the, Jiralhanae, they seem to be called… want to kill the human." Rina said, as the frame zoomed in on the single armored human - who was currently being chased by a hammer-wielding Jiralhanae. "And the Sangheili - the other aliens - want to kill that human too… neither race seems to like the other very much…"

"Why do they want to kill him?" Takeshi asked, "Aside from being human I mean."

"That… is where I'm not sure," Rina shrugged "I keep getting info of the aliens - the Covenant - calling him a 'Demon', how he's slayed countless numbers of their people, destroyed some kind of super carrier, killed a field marshall and… well, reports say he also killed most - if not all - of the aliens that are… currently lying dead in that area."

"The way he moves…" Brok'Tan mused, watching the human fight. "He's severely wounded… yet he moves with such precision, with such speed… a mere human couldn't _possibly_ do all that… "

"The evidence is… kinda right there," Kim commented. "Plus, sensors pick up the wreckage of a large ship towards the mountains… what's left of one anyways…"

Personally, Takeshi thought they were seeing the result of some form of Augment program, but he wasn't one to judge. "We'll rescue him, either way," he said, hitting a button on the helm console. "Transporter Room, lock on to the one human lifesign below us and beam him up to sickbay ASAP!"

* * *

One slip up was all it took.

One misstep, a moment when he should've ducked instead of jumped. The Brute Chieftan swung its Grav Hammer, which hit the pillar he took cover behind, hitting Jaden behind it as he went flying with the rubble, before tumbling to the ground. His entire body was in pain, as if every bone in his body was broken at once - which might as well be the case, he was amazed he even survived that blow.

"Heh… and at last… you're mine." The Chieftain gloated, as he stepped towards him. "You put up a good fight… but it ends here."

As the Chieftain raised up his hammer, Jaden took one last deep breath, the vision in his eyes starting to blur out. "Hope I… made it… count..." he groaned out.

As the Chieftain brought the hammer down though, Jaden thought he saw a bright, blue light around him… but then, everything went dark.

* * *

"WHAT?!" Goliath roared out, as his Hammer struck the ground… _just_ the ground, as the Demon seemed to vanish into thin air.

How was that possible? Did he cloak? No, he could not have moved that quickly, he would've died either way. He was there, he was about to avenge his pack mate!

And then he vanished, as if he was never there at all.

The Chieftain let out a blood-curling scream, his vision going red as he looked at where the Sangheili, who continued to fight his forces. He was angry, he demanded blood. He lost the Demon… but Sangheili will do _just right_ for now…

* * *

 **117Jorn: And we conclude the first actual chapter of the Odyssey, and the beginning of the Halo Arc!**

 **Takeshi Yamato: And Jaden gets rescued just in the nick of time! By the way, if you're wondering what is meant by 'Maxims' and 'Maxim 37', look up Schlock Mercenary's 'Seventy Maxims of Maximally Effective Mercenaries. Those things are fun, funny, and sometimes really handy. 37's one of my favorites, but you can bet there will be more Maxims used during this story. :D**

 **Ron the True Fan: I hope everyone loves religion jokes, because this is going to get funny.**

 **117Jorn: Until next time though…**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**


	3. Chapter 3

**117jorn: Hey everyone! Another week, another update for the Odyssey!**

* * *

 **August 30th, 2553 AD, Epsilon Eridani System**

 **USS _Firestorm_ , Bridge**

* * *

" _He killed how many?_ "

Takeshi sighed, nodding as he looked at the image of Ron on the main screen of the _Firestorm_ "Judging from what we saw, the human we recovered killed… well, all of the aliens around him until the Jiralhanae and Sangheili started fighting one another, and even then, while wounded in several areas, he kept on fighting with a skill… well, I'll let the video do most of the talking."

" _Sounds like me when I get mad._ "

"What is it with you and joking today, Ron?"

" _Take, Take, Take._ " Ron shook his head " _I just learned that a bunch of genocidal assholes are playing schoolyard bully. The_ only _thing keeping me from going on a homicidal rampage is humor. So please, indulge me._ "

Takeshi sighed again, though to be honest he was restraining himself from going on a rampage as well. What these aliens - this 'Covenant' was doing was inexcusable. From what they managed to hack from their computers, they learned that this planet - Reach - was not the first world to be 'Glassed'. These aliens have been doing this for nearly _thirty years_ to hundreds of other worlds… all of which were human colonies to the 'United Nations Space Command'.

The only thing really holding him back, was that he was just waiting for the _Ra Cailum_ to show up.

" _So, how is the Soldier?_ " Ron asked. " _Not good judging from that hammer strike…_ "

"Actually… while he is severely wounded… we believe he'll make a full recovery." Takeshi answered, causing Ron to blink.

" _How the hell does a man survive THAT?_ " He asked, " _A strike like that'd cripple a regular man… what do you know Take?_ "

Takeshi, once again, sighed "Well… Mogire reported to me about what she's learned so far." He said, "This man… it looks like he's been augmented to an extreme degree."

" _How so?_ "

"There seem to be multiple drugs within his body which enhance certain features," he explained. "Including a carbide ceramic ossification catalyst which allows his skeleton to become virtually unbreakable - which is probably why he's still in one piece. She also discovered a fibroid muscular protein complex drug which allows increased density of individual's muscles, allowing heavier lifting, along with retina-inversion stabilizer drugs, colloidal neural disunification solution, and some Platinum pellet containing human growth hormone catalyst implanted in the thyroid which seems to boost growth of skeletal and muscle tissues…"

" _That sounds like some of the crap the Augments took during the Eugenics Wars taken to a greater degree._ "

"It is." Takeshi nodded. "His armor suit is almost like the advanced ones the MACOs use, but in a few ways not as advanced. I'll let Sonja take a look at it once you get here; Matt's good, but the _Firestorm's_ not equipped for a technical analysis of this level."

Ron nodded on the screen. " _As soon as we get there, prepare yourself. We're going hunting._ Ra-Cailum _Actual out._ "

The link cut, and Luna had to ask the question. "Why do we still work with him?"

"Because while he's an ass, he likes us enough to give us our own ship?" Takeshi shrugged "Sure, it's an _Aquarius_ , but it may as well be a full-fledged starship with all the mods Sonja put into her."

He then stood up "Well… For now, we stay in cloak, but keep scanning the system. If there is anyone else we can help before Ron shows up, we'll help. I'll head down and check on our guest."

* * *

 **Meanwhile - USS _Firestorm_**

 **Sick Bay**

* * *

He expected silence, he expected nothingness, hell he even though to expect those 'pearly gates' he keeps hearing about. But as his vision slowly returned, he got none of the above, everything was blurry, meshed together. But while his eyes were adjusting, he could still hear.

"The man's lucky to be alive…"

"After all of that punishment? Yeah…"

"No, the way these augmentations were added to his body - while effectively placed, the odds of… well, _anyone_ surviving such a procedure are… _Very_ low, and would've had to be placed at a very young age… 13-15 years at most."

"Damn… What could- wait… Doctor! I think he's waking up!"

Six's vision began to return, as he finally got a good look at his surroundings. He saw beds, syringes, basic medical gear, it looked like he was in the med bay of a facility or ship. But he was unfamiliar with the configuration of the equipment.

A woman approached him, wearing some type of uniform he was unfamiliar with, but had a calm smile "Hello," she spoke, "How are you feeling?"

Six looked at the woman cautiously, something… Didn't feel right, he didn't know what it was but… "I'm guessing… This isn't the afterlife?" He asked.

"No, you're alive," the woman chuckled. "Just try and relax, we need to make sure your wounds are healed up properly."

"Where am I?"

"On board the starship _Firestorm_ ," she answered. "There is a longer explanation, but-"

At that moment though, another figure entered the sick bay. Jaden turned… And saw someone who was definitely **_not_** human. A black skinned humanoid with a vastly bumpy veined forehead.

"How is he, doctor?" the thing asked.

"Just woke up Brok'tan," she said. "We're going to-" she paused, as the Betazoid woman suddenly felt a _surge_ of emotions behind her. Fear… and Rage. She turn around in time only to watch as the patient moved with inhuman speed, hitting her along her neck knocking her out.

"Seda-!" Another doctor shouted, but Six moved too fast for their eyes as he punched the next doctor, knocking him out as well. The medical personel tried to restrain him, but he was simply too strong, batting them off him.

Brok'tan acted next, shouting as he jumped at Jaden, however the SPARTAN round-house kicked the alien, sending him flying into a wall. He didn't even have a chance to recover before Jaden slammed his foot against his leg, breaking it like a twig as the Klingon howled in pain.

"I've seen a lot of Covies… But you're the ugliest I've met so far," Jaden growled. "Tell me what's going on, or the next thing I break is your goddamned neck."

"I am not a part of this 'Covenant' that has attacked your world," Brok'tan replied. "We didn't even know of their existence until our arrival here."

Jaden did not believe him. But he had to take a chance that this was a safe place, and if he killed this one, Jaden could expect to be airlocked.

So instead of breaking his neck, he simply knocked the being out. If this was a covenant ship, he could take control of it, take it to an UNSC outpost and they could use it against the bastards.

If he could clear out a Corvette, this should be easy. He opened the doors of the sick bay, and headed out to look for a map… And a disguise.

* * *

Takeshi sighed as he read the report. "Yeah, in hindsight Brok'tan probably wasn't the best person to check up on him, not that we knew he'd wake up just then," he remarked. "Wouldn't surprise me if the humans of this realm are at least partially xenophobic, if the only extraterrestrial contact they've made is with the Covenant."

"Well… it could've been worse," Luna shrugged. "We saw how fast he moved, how easily he took out Brok'tan… He could've killed everyone in sick bay, but he seemed to restrain himself."

"So… what now?" Kim asked.

"We have to find him," Takeshi replied. "Kim, see if you can get the internal sensors calibrated to search for his specific augmentations. Luna, you and I will personally lead the security teams in searching for him. If he attacks, set weapons to stun only."

"I recommend we switch all computer functions to biometric only. It'll keep him from using all but the most basic systems."

"I assume those work?"

"Sonja and the captain ran a full test before we left; all systems green. He won't be getting far using push levers."

Takeshi nodded. "Alright, do it," he said. "Let's find him quickly."

* * *

Jaden tried to access the ship's layout on one of the computer terminals, but it wasn't working. "Come on, come on!"

"Warning: biometric signature does not match those on roster. Access denied."

Jaden growled. He was thankful it wasn't an AI he was dealing with, but the computer was starting to piss him off. He needed a map to figure out how to escape, but of all things it asked for biometrics. He had to find a way to break the security, of course he didn't have an AI with him, so he needs to find a way to break the lock-

"Hold it right there!" A voice shouted as Jaden turned to see a man wearing one of the crewmen's uniforms, pointing some device at him - which he presumed was a handgun of some kind. "Hands where I can see them!"

Jaden rolled his eyes, raising his hands as he faced the guard. Before he eyed the gun. "…You don't even have the safety off, rookie." He muttered.

"I'm no rookie!" The guard declared, "I'm a ten year vet! Besides, these things don't have safeties."

Jaden rose his eyebrow, glancing at the weapon again. The guard then looked at his own weapon for a brief moment. And that was all Six needed as he closed the distance between them, slapping the weapon from out of his grasp before he grabbed his arms, held them behind his back and forces the man to the deck.

"How the hell _you_ survive _ten years_?" Jaden asked, before hitting the man in the back of the head - knocking him out.

Jaden stood up, it wouldn't take long before any of his friends showed up. He needed a uniform and a bio… He glanced at the unconscious guard, smirking.

"Finally some _good_ luck." He mused, as he dragged the guard away towards the console, as he took off his gear.

* * *

 **Later - with Takeshi**

* * *

"Oh, great, now he has a uniform," Takeshi remarked, as the unconscious guard was taken off to sickbay. "This is going to be even harder now. Still, it seems he knows he can't use the computers." There was a small pause. "I'm tempted to partially lift the biometrics, but only just enough so that he can look at our historical records."

"I think there was an option for that."

"And whose idea was that? Sonja's?"

Luna looked at the lockout options. "Nope, that Orion woman in main engineering. Who is probably the reason it's always a mess down there." Luna didn't like Sonja's Orion assistant, mostly because Mitod was a flirt and always trying to get into Takeshi's pants.

If it weren't for the fact he was married and partially immune, he'd've given in LONG ago.

"Alright, then," he said after a moment. "Do it. Maybe he won't be quite so aggressive if he manages to read our history files, and realizes we're not from anywhere around here." He wasn't too hopeful, but it was worth a shot.

* * *

This was not a normal ship. The uniforms were professional, the weapons well-cared for and designed for human use, and everything was in english.

Either he was having a near-death experience and was still on Reach, slowly bleeding to death, or this was an Innie ship working with aliens.

Still, he got what he needed. Using the 'PADD' device and the biometrics of the guard, he was able to download the schematics to the ship, and thankfully it was all still in English.

There were really only three ways off this boat: via Shuttlecraft, an escape pod, or something called a 'transporter beam'. Since he had no idea what the latter was, his best chance was the craft or he pods.

However, before he did that, he discovered the ship had an honest to god _tractor beam_ system, and believed it wise to disable that first or it was going to be the shortest escape in history.

Using the map, he managed to find the tractor beam controls room - currently unstaffed, the crew likely looking for him. This made his job easier, as he ID'd the controls themselves. He attempted to access them, but once again was met with the 'access denied'.

Fortunately, there were… Other ways to disable machines… By using the weapon he took and firing into the console, blasting it to pieces.

"That should buy me some time…" He muttered, as he headed for the door, which opened. But someone was standing on the other side. Jaden went on alert… Until he realized the figure was a young girl, likely no older than three.

The two looked at one another, Jaden frozen stiff, but the girl just looked at him curiously.

"…Scuse m-me, m-mister?" The girl asked shyly, "Do… Do you know where the bridge is?"

Jaden blinked, before remembering he _was_ wearing the standard uniform of these people. The girl must assume he's a crewman. He _could_ knock her out… But If there was one thing six couldn't do, it was bringing any harm to a child.

"…n-no, sorry," he said. "I'm.. Fairly new to the ship… I don't know where anything's at, really…"

"I… I see…" the little girl said. "I wanted to… go be with my parents… they're normally on the bridge… but I don't know where everything is, either…"

"Who are your parents?" Jaden asked, kneeling down to the girl's height to look a bit less intimidating, while trying to play the role as a fellow crewman of the ship.

"Tou-san is the one in charge, though he likes to fly the ship, too," the girl said. "Kaa-san… I don't know exactly what she does, but I've seen her carrying some kind of long thing around a lot."

' _…goddamn my conscience!_ ' he mentally cursed. Here he was being _giftwrapped_ a perfect hostage - the daughter of the _freaking ship's captain_ , a guaranteed ticket off this boat. But Jaden couldn't bring himself to actually do the deed. But he didn't show his frustration, as he forced a smile.

"Wow," he said. "Your tou-san sounds important…" he glanced around, he _knew_ this was a horrible, horrible idea, but damnit he couldn't just _leave_ the girl here alone. He just hoped his disguise held for long enough. "…Tell you what, I'll stick with you for a bit until we find someone who knows this ship _way_ better than I do. Deal?"

"Sure!" the little girl said cheerfully.

He took her hand and she tilted her head in the most adorable fashion possible. "You got a grip like Uncle Ronnie," she said.

Jaden did not want to know who 'Uncle Ronnie' was, but if he and the man in question were alike, he was happy the man was nowhere NEAR him.

* * *

 **USS _Ra Cailum_ \- Reach orbit**

* * *

The 1080-meter-long dreadnought dropped out of warp, still out of phase and invisible to the naked eye. "Report."

"Do the words 'target-rich environment' mean anything to you, sir?" Cassie spoke, "There are so many alien ships, I'm having a hard time counting them all."

"Give me numbers, Cassie."

"Roughly 488 Starships of various sizes and classifications," Cassie informed, data streaming across her visor. "Most of these vessels appear to be participating in the orbital bombardment of the planet… however, I am detecting a small detachment of twelve vessels approaching a space station."

"What's there?" Ron asked.

"Sizable station, from the looks of things it seems to be a shipyard of some kind… " Cassie's eyes narrowed slightly. "Ron, I've got several ships already there… I believe they are human ships."

"Where are they and how many?" He asked.

"I am detecting only three vessels that appear to match this universe's human starships." Cassie informed, "From what I am picking up, they are the Destroyer UNSC _Jericho_ , and the Frigates UNSC _Providence_ and _Saratoga_. They appear to be defending the station in question, and are already fighting a vanguard of Covenant ships."

Ron closed his eyes, remembering another ship with the name _Saratoga_.

' _Not again._ ' "Prepare to decloak. All hands, prepare for combat." Alarms began going off throughout the dreadnought-class starship, alerting everyone to prepare for war. "Tell Mobius Squadron to stand by."

* * *

 **CAS-class Assault Carrier ' _Seeker of Truth_ '**

* * *

Thel Vadamee watched as the human world was slowly destroyed. They fought well, he would give them that, but was it bravery or simple desperation that caused this struggle? It mattered little: the result was the same. While they had lost the sacred location beneath the glacier, they would have ultimate victory so long as they acquire the artifact within the mountains.

Another human ship managed to escape though, a ship their sensors identified as the ' _Pillar of Autumn_ '. Thel would've pursued the vessel himself, but he wished to squash the last of the humans of this world first. He had sent several _CCS_ Battlecruisers to pursue the human vessel in his stead.

While their ground forces continued to assault non-glassed areas of the planet, Thel now lead a detachment of the fleet towards the last remaining orbital station of the planet, defended only by a trio of light human warships. He could so easily wipe them all out with a few plasma torpedoes from the entire fleet… but, he wished to give these last few humans an honorable fight and death. For surviving this long against their forces, it was the least that they've earned.

Once they were dealt with, he had _another_ issue to handle, as he scowled looking at another view screen, where several Jiralhanae warships maneuvered with their fleet. The Apes - the _Brutes_ as the humans have so accurately named them - assaulted Rtas's own forces as they attempted to slay one of the infamous Demons, fighting one another for the honor of the kill. Worse was that the very prey they fought for seemed to have escaped them.

The Chieftain Goalith claimed the Demon escaped in a flash of light, but Thel simply saw it as another lie of the Brutes.

"Assume standard assault formation," Thel ordered, "Have the _Highest Might_ lead the first with a Golden Path battle group. That should be fair enough for the Humans."

As he ordered that, a single _CCS_ -class battlecruiser moved ahead of the fleet, escorted by two flanking _SDV_ -class Heavy Corvettes. The Corvettes would help reinforce the _Highest Might_ , each vessel in the formation providing large fire support, especially when firing plasma torpedo ordnance. It was as fair as it was going to get for the humans.

Thel watched as the vessels head towards the human station, however just before they were about to enter firing range… appearing form a shimmer of light, a single, Cruiser-sized vessel seemed to materialize before the entire fleet, boasting a design the Supreme Commander has never seen before.

The Commander actually stood from his chair in surprise. "By the Prophets, what is _that_?" he demanded.

"Fleetmaster, the vessel is hailing us!"

Thel gestured for them to receive the transmission.

" _Unknown vessel, this is the United Federation of Planets Starship_ Ra Cailum _. Stand down your forces, or I will show you what I do to bullies. You have 30 seconds._ "

Thel studied the ship. The text on the saucer was human. This ship was human, and displayed technology on par with theirs. And the faction they claimed to be part of, this… 'United Federation of Planets', it was different from what he has known the human's governing body usually refers itself as - the 'UNSC'.

As a member of the Covenant and at war with Humanity, he _should_ attack… however, the back of his mind, the tactical strategist told him it _may_ be ideal to stay his blade… for now. Ancient Sangheili tactics always warned of attacking an enemy you knew nothing of… and this ship, the _Ra Cailum_ … it was unknown to them.

Unfortunately… it seemed the Jiralhanae did not share that idea. " _Bah! What do we care for what humans say!_ " A Brute Destroyer advanced upon the unknown vessel. " _We will destroy your ship just as we've done countless others, Vermin!_ "

Thel didn't have time to order the Brutes to cease fire, as the _CPV_ -class Destroyer unleashed a volley of Plasma Torpedoes at the human vessel. However it did not even bother to evade… and Thel understood why, when the torpedoes hit the side of the enemy ship… only to impact against an invisible barrier surround it.

This human ship had _shields_.

" _…You DO realize you just forfeited your only chance to live, yes? Ok._ **My turn** _. Corpie, return fire._ "

One of the trenches on the saucer lit up, two points meeting to create an orange beam that impacted the Brute ship, the shields barely holding up for a mere three seconds before coring the CPV, splitting it in half before secondary explosions finished it off. "By the gods… We are outmatched!"

The Brutes didn't get the idea as they continued to attack the dreadnought. With predictably similar results; the human ship ( _Ra Cailum_ , Thel reminded himself, as the ship's name was worthy of remembrance) sustained zero damage while the offenders were slaughtered.

"Alert all ships!" Thel barked. "All vessels system-wide are to report to our position **NOW!** We must stop that ship!"

* * *

 **Meanwhile - USS _Firestorm_**

 **With Jaden**

* * *

"So… are you with Uncle Ronny's Marines?" The girl - whom Six had learned was named Larcei - asked as they traveled through the ship's interior.

"Um, yeah, yeah I am." Jaden nodded, cursing that he was lying to a kid. Sure it was necessary, but he _hated_ lying to children. "I… usually work alone though…"

"Why?" Larcei asked, tilting her head to the side "It's no fun to be alone…"

Jaden bit his lip slightly "I just… do," he said. "Used to have friends but… they're… gone."

"Oh… will they come back someday?" The young girl asked.

Noble six paused for a moment, thinking back to his last team… Jorge, Kat, Jun, Carter, Emile… "…I don't think so, Larcei…" he whispered.

"Larcei!" came a voice from up ahead.

"Kaa-san!" Larcei shouted, running up to a woman in a red-trimmed uniform, with dark red hair down to the nape of her neck, purple-blue eyes, and a slender figure with an above-average bust.

"There you are! I've been looking all over for you!" The woman said, as she embraced the young girl. "I told you to stay on the bridge!"

"I know, but… I wanted to look around and…" Larcei said, before bowing her head. "Sorry Kaa-san… but, Jaden-san stayed with me until you found us!"

The woman turned to face Jaden. "You seem somewhat familiar," she said. "Have we met before?"

"I… doubt so, ma'am." He said, continuing to work with his alias. "I was only recently assigned here."

She clearly didn't believe him. "Well, I don't know all of the MACOs assigned to the _Ra Cailum_." She shrugged "We've got an escaped patient: he thinks that he's in danger and I'd like to get him back in sickbay before Ron decides to get involved. You know how he gets when everything's not in order."

"He gets mad! Very mad!"

Luna smiled at her daughter. "Yes, Uncle Ron gets very mad. Mad enough to make me avoid making him mad."

Jaden got the idea that this was a smaller craft compared to 'Uncle Ron's' ship. He'd overheard 'Commander Yamato' a few times on the PA, and 'Ron' clearly outranked him: a captain at least.

"Though we've altered the biometric lockouts a bit," Luna remarked, on the off chance that their runaway was nearby and hearing, even if he wasn't the guy in front of her like part of her was considering. "We're letting him access our historical records freely - hopefully letting him see we're not from anywhere around here, and just how far away from home we are, will make him a bit less aggressive."

"Let's… hope that works," Jaden nodded. "Well… if you'll excuse me ma'am, I need to get back to my station."

"Bye Mr. Jaden!" Larcei waved, Jaden nodding before he walked off through the corridors. "I like him, Kaa-san! He's really nice!"

Luna nodded, watching him go. "Agreed," she said. "Anyway, let's get you back to the bridge."

She led her daughter away from Jaden, who was starting to get curious. Other than the alien he beat the crap out of, everyone seemed human. And even then, they weren't trying to kill him. He wouldn't trust a word they said, but this was getting weirder and weirder.

' _They said something about historical documents…_ ' he thought, as he made his way to the escape pods. ' _I'll give those a look while setting the pods up…_ ' he found a nearby computer access terminal, and after connecting his PADD he downloaded the historical documents. He proceeded to read through them, as he made it to the pods and got to work. However, the more he read the documents, the more and more odd things seemed.

They spoke of events that simply never happened. "Warp" travel was never created, they had Slipstream, and that didn't come until 2291, this document claimed humanity not only achieved FTL capacity earlier, but made _peaceful_ first contact with aliens called 'Vulcans'. And it went on to talk about other aliens, like Klingons, Romulans, Ferengi, the list went on, but none of it made sense, especially the galactic map, showing just how few worlds have been discovered, in stark contrast to starmaps _he_ had seen which showed humanity's territory _much_ larger before the Covenant attacked Harvest - and speaking of them there was no mention of any of the Covenant races.

None of it made any form of sense, why have historical documents that didn't say an ounce of truth to history? Jaden shook his head, as he worked on figuring out how to open the escape pod doors. ' _If they think they can trick me_ that _easily, they're idiots._ ' he thought.

Then his gaze fell upon an entry called 'Mirror Universe'. Calling it up brought up tales of contact with an entirely different universe, granted the history was still supposedly somewhat similar to what the documents were saying. However, this tale brought up the concept of multiverse theory - where multiple universes exist, covering any potential thing that may or may not happen.

Which begged the question: what if this ship had crossed over from another universe, one where events followed the path listed in those documents, rather than the way he'd been taught in history class?

Jaden then slapped himself. "Grow the fuck up, Jaden," he muttered. "This is _reality_ , not science fiction. You can't _cross_ universes like in a Sci fi show!"

"Actually, while it requires a lot of power to do so intentionally, transitioning between universes can be and has been done," said a voice, as Jaden swirled around, his gun raised, to see a man with dark brown hair in a buzz cut, a bushy moustache of the same color, and amethyst eyes. "So has time travel, really."

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: Dun-dun-DUN… CLIFFHANGER!**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Yup. Things are definitely getting interesting.**

 **117Jorn: The Covenant are about to learn why no one F**ks with the Federation! And what of Jaden? How will he take this new news? Find out next time on Odyssey! Until next time…**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**


	4. Chapter 4

**117jorn: Hey everyone! Another week, another update for the Odyssey!**

* * *

 **August 30th, 2553 AD, Epsilon Eridani System**

 **UNSC _Saratoga_**

* * *

There was something to be said about irony. For the past thirty years, the UNSC had gotten its' ass kicked by superior covenant forces, and now...

Now one ship was kicking the crap out of an entire Covenant armada, giving Adrian Drake time to evac everyone off Anchor Nine.

Wasn't THAT a kick to the balls?

"Astarte," Adrian spoke, after he _finally_ managed to regain his voice. "Who… or _what_ are these people?"

The holotank on the bridge of the _Saratoga_ lit up, as the orange holographic image of a figure wearing military fatigues appeared. "Unknown… Captain," the A.I Astarte informed. "All that I can really tell you is their weapons, shields their… _everything_ is far beyond anything the UNSC have encountered…" Another Covenant Frigate explode in a fireball "...as have the Covenant it seems."

"They're helping us, and sound human." Adrian said, "That makes them friends in my book. Status on the evacuation?"

"Firehawk is reporting they've loaded up the next batch of station personnel, and are leaving now." Astarte informed, "However 43% of the base personnel are still on the station. It will take two more trips before they are all evacuated, and even with _their_ help it will only be a matter of time before we are overrun."

"Damn," Adrian cursed. "Try and hail that ship - if they have any dropships we might be able to speed the evac up."

"Hailing frequency open."

"This is Captain Adrian Drake, of the UNSC _Saratoga_ to the Starship _Ra Cailum_ ," the captain spoke. "I don't know who you work for, but if you wanna help if you have any dropships or shuttles we need help evacuating Anchor 9!"

"This is Captain Ronald Pinkerton. How many people are over there?"

"Does that matter?!"

"Yes. It determines how fast we can evacuate them."

Adrian sighed. "Roughly 578 people are still onboard," he informed.

"Well, hate to disappoint, but we won't need any shuttles. Lock on and energize."

'Energize? What the hell—'

"Captain… I just checked Anchor Nine. There's no one on board. It's like they just disappeared."

"What?" The captain demanded, "That's impossible! Check again!"

"I did. Three times. There is no one on Anchor Nine. They just disappeared."

"…Who ARE these people? Get them on the horn again!"

"Channel open, sir."

" _Saratoga_ to _Ra Cailum_ ," Adrian shouted, "What the HELL did you just do?!"

" _They're nice and safe, Captain. Told you we didn't need any shuttles. Now, is there any kind of assistance I can provide?_ "

Drake didn't want to know. "Like...what?"

" _Oh, you know...medical assistance, humanitarian aid_ …" The _Ra-Cailum_ fired a red projectile at a _CAS_ -class assault carrier, which impacted the shields.

Before cracking it in half, secondaries finishing the Covenant ship off. " _That sort of thing_."

Drake groaned ' _The Spooks are gonna go APESHIT for this…_ ' he thought. "Just… keep the Covenant off our backs!" He declared.

" _Just give us a few minutes._ "

* * *

 **Meanwhile - USS _Firestorm_**

* * *

Jaden's grip on the weapon was tight, finger hovering over the trigger as he faced the sword wielding man. "You're going to have to wake someone _pretty_ _early_ in the morning to trick them like that, Innie," he growled.

"There's no trick," the sword-wielding man replied. "Honestly, we've dealt with temporal and multi-universal shenanigans so many times it isn't even funny." Under his breath, he muttered, " _Still_ going to kick Q's ass for that time he dumped me and Luna in the bloody Revolutionary War…"

"You're an idiot if you think you're gonna trick me like that," Jaden stated. "Now, _you_ are going to let me leave, because I need to get back to Reach. And you traitors aren't going to stop me, innie."

Takeshi just sighed. Apparently 'innie' was short for 'insurrectionist', and apparently they had such a movement here, in conjunction with the alien invasion. "Two things," he said. "First, we saved your life by using our Transporters to beam you out of that battlefield before that alien with the hammer could land a final blow. And from what we've been able to determine, your people don't have any kind of point-to-point instant movement technology like that. From what we're able to gather, neither do the 'Covenant' you've been fighting."

"Teleported?" Jaden scoffed. "Please, I'm not an idiot. There are at least several explanations to how I survived. You could have had forces on the ground, spying, sniped the Brute before taking me away."

"Second, if we really were from this universe, and 'traitors'," Takeshi continued, gesturing towards a nearby window, "Do you think that we could and would do something like what you will see out there?"

Jaden glanced to the side, doing a double take as he saw a strange vessel soaring within the Covenant fleet, firing energy beams left and right scoring hit after hit on the Covenant ships, turning several smaller ones into hunks of scrap within seconds.

Jaden was… stunned, but only for a brief moment as he diverted his attention back at the man. "Nice Holoscreen," he muttered. "How much did it cost to install that? Few thousand cred's?"

Takeshi just blinked. "You mean your universe never developed Transparent Aluminum?" he asked. "Jeez, over 150 years further ahead of us temporally, and yet so incredibly _backward_ in some areas…"

Jaden's eyes narrowed. Something was wrong here. The man kept talking and acting as though he were being honest - yet everything he was saying was utterly ludicrous. Teleportation? Multiverse theory? Transparent aluminum? He had never seen any of these things before, he _had_ to be lying… Yet why was he starting to believe him?

"…you can believe whatever _you_ want, buddy." Jaden shook his head, as he pressed a button as the escape pod hatch opened. "But _I_ am going back to Reach."

"Why?" Takeshi asked, "We've seen the scans, even with Ron fighting them they're still going to glass the planet."

"I still have a duty."

"What duty?"

"To make it count," Jaden replied, glaring back at Takeshi. "We won't let Reach fall so easily."

"If you go back there, you'll die." Takeshi warned.

Jaden laughed as he entered the pod "Die? Heh, maybe you aren't from around here." He said, looking at him. "Otherwise you'd know… SPARTANS never die, we're just missing in action. Oh, and tell the Captain I said your welcome for looking after his daughter for half an hour - she's a good kid." Takeshi blinked before the hatch to the pod closed, followed by a light _Thump_ as it jettisoned.

Takeshi sighed. Well, that explained the encounter Luna had told him about on his way to the escape pods. He went over to a nearby comm panel, and tapped a button. "Rina, I need you to open a channel to the _Ra Cailum_ \- and patch it down here, please."

" _Channel open._ "

" _Take, about time you answered my calls. I need you to dock; we've got refugees over here and I need your medical staff. Speaking of which, what the hell's going on? You just launched an escape pod._ "

Takeshi sighed. "It's the guy we rescued, Ron," he said. "He regained consciousness, and things were apparently going alright until Brok'tan walked into the medical bay, and he basically fought his way out."

" _So he pulled a me when Rutia rescued my ass from Vega colony._ "

"You were still dealing with that Borg crap in your head, he was trying to actually escape."

" _Doesn't really matter; he wants to commit suicide, let him. We'll pick up the pod as soon as it makes planetfall._ "

Takeshi sighed. "Right. He also seemed to think we were 'innies' - and basing on the context, I think that term is short for 'insurrectionist'. We found a way to give him a copy of our historical records, but I don't think they changed his viewpoint much, if at all."

" _His choice. As soon as we're done here, we're firing up that wormhole drive and heading home, so get back here, Commander._ "

"You got it, Ron."

* * *

Jaden knew for a fact that hologram generators were too expensive for something like an escape pod, and it didn't feel like a screen. No, what he was seeing through the viewports was real.

Or these people were _really_ committed to getting him to believe their story, as he watched the saucer-shaped ship fire at a SDV Corvette, sending it flying down to the surface without taking a scratch from the ship's plasma cannons.

Jaden sighed, either way, whether they were telling the truth or not, it didn't change his goal. Once he hit the surface, he needed to regroup with UNSC forced on the ground. His biggest issue was his… lack of armor at the moment, the uniform did little to protect from plasma, or _anything_ really. He might be able to scavenge _some_ armor on the planet, but he didn't hold much hope to it.

He guided the pod down towards the planet, as he fell towards the surface. "Let's make it count…" He muttered, holding the dog tags in his hand.

* * *

Thel had seen many things in his years serving the Covenant, but in all of his years of his campaign against the humans... None of it compared to the sheer dominance this ship, this one _human_ ship, was inflicting upon his fleet. Roughly half an hour into the fighting and it had already slaughtered nearly 100 vessels, including the assault carrier _Vigilant Fever_.

If they stayed, the entire fleet could be destroyed. Which left Thel with only one option.

"Order all space forces to fall back."

"F-fleet master?"

"We cannot continue taking these kind of losses!" Thel barked. "We fall back and regroup with the rest of the armada for an organized assault!"

One of the few RPV-Class destroyers that survived the initial assault was hacked in two by the _Ra Cailum_ , sending it falling to its' death towards the surface. They had discovered their doom.

Its' name was _Ra Cailum_. And her captain was mad.

* * *

"Enemy warships are falling back. Clearly, we've made an impression."

"About time. Tell the _Firestorm_ to dock and prepare shuttlecraft for launch, fill them to overload and make preparations to dock."

Sonja raised an eyebrow. "Dock? No offense, but we barely know these people."

"First rule of Starfleet officer's school: help those in need. Corpie, full security measures."

* * *

 **UNSC _Saratoga_**

 **A few hours later**

* * *

"Are you sure this is wise, Captain?"

Captain Drake sighed, as he stood at the airlock as the _Saratoga_ maneuvered along the port side of the vessel which clearly saved their lives. "Don't have much choice," he said, "These people saved our hides. We might of lost Reach, but we might be able to gain some help evacuating the people still on the surface before the Covenant come back to finish what they started."

Astarte sighed on the holoscreen next to the airlock "Just… be careful, Captain." She said, "And remember, friendly or not, the Cole Protocol is still in effect."

"I realize that," Drake nodded, as the ship shook slightly as they latched onto the _Ra Cailum's_ air lock. "Well… here goes nothin..."

THe Saratoga's inner and outer hatches opened, before the counterparts on the Ra Cailum opened, revealing three humans, one of which had tattoos of some kind on the sides of her head. With the exception of the tattoo lady, they wore black uniforms with gray shoulders, with the man wearing a red turtleneck while the other woman had a yellow one. The odd one out wore a uniform where the gray was replaced with black, the black with a light shade of blue and it was all one jacket, worn under a blue overcoat. "Captain Drake, I'm Captain Pinkerton. This is my chief engineer, Sonja Henderson and my chief medical officer, Rutia Yulanra. I figured I'd bring a couple of my people to assess your situation while we talked."

"Thank you, Captain Pinkerton." Drake nodded "Welcome aboard the _Saratoga_ … I believe we both have a _lot_ of questions to ask one another."

"Indeed. Ladies, do your jobs while the captain and I have a nice long chat."

"You got it, boss." Rutia simply nodded as she followed Sonja back to their ship, where they retrieved a pair of kits. "So, got anyone to spare to lead us where we're needed, Cap?"

"I can help you with that," The holo screen snapped back to life, as Astarte's image appeared. "Shipboard A.I ATE-1940-3184, Astarte, at your service. I will warn you though that, as per Cole Protocol you are not allowed near the Navigation Systems."

"Cole Protocol?"

"Clearly you have an interesting story to tell, Captain."

Ron smirked. "Indeed, although if this protocol involves Earth's location… We already know where our homeworld is, so no point."

This was going to cause problems, Drake decided. "So, as soon as we're done, I'd like to send over as many medical personnel as I've got to help out."

"Why not send them now, Captain Pinkerton?"

"Because… not all of them are human."

Drake rose his brow at that "Excuse me?" He asked.

"Not everyone in the crew of the _Ra Cailum_ are human," Ron repeated, but before Drake could speak he rose his hand. "Before you say anything, not a single one of them are in any shape or form related to the Covenant - in fact, none of us have heard about the Covenant until we recently arrived here."

"I… see," Drake spoke. "I… suppose it's not impossible… big galaxy afterall… but, I will warn you that some of the crew won't act very… kindly around aliens… we've been fighting for our very survival for nearly 30 years now against the Covenant afterall…"

"Really. You've met one."

"Excuse me?"

"Rutia's a Trill; non-human. Other than the spots, and a few… other additional features, she's just like you and me. Come on, let's go to your briefing room; I'd rather have this discussion in private, WITHOUT your AI listening in, preferably."

Drake spared an odd glance at Rutia, before nodding "Yes, that… can be arranged," he said. "Follow me."

* * *

 **Reach - UNSC Rally point**

* * *

The UNSC forces were down to half a platoon of Marines, three squads of Army troops, a few dozen vehicles and, with Jaden's arrival, one Spartan-III. They were screwed. And they knew it. But they were not getting off Reach. This soon-to-be glassed planet was going to be their mass grave, and there wasn't a damn thing that could change it.

Despite this though, they had one final hope of survival: the UNSC _St. Elizabeth_. The old _Phoenix_ -class Colony Ship was one of the first ships to land on Reach after it had been terraformed and colonized, but unlike other colony ships that were disassembled to build the settlements, the _St. Elizabeth_ was converted into a museum ship. Now, personnel from the UNSC Engineering corps were working overtime to bring the old colony ship to minimal functioning capacity so they could escape Reach. It was fool's hope, but… hope was still hope, Jaden guessed.

Jaden adjusted to the new armor that he wore. As luck would have it, the Engineers were transporting the old Mark-IV MJOLNIR armor suits that the SPARTAN-II's used to wear before they upgraded to the Mark-V - one of the engineers claiming it use to be the Master Chief's armor. While it was still MJOLNIR, the Mark IV lacked the shields that his old Mark V(B) variant possessed. It wasn't too much of a distraction - MJOLNIR was MJOLNIR after all, and while he prefered his old armor's design and specs, it was better than running around in that abominable "Starfleet" uniform.

That Red uniform was just _screaming_ for someone to shoot him.

Once he was adjusted to the armor, he looked at his weapons. He had acquired an MA37, a DMR and an M6G on his way here, though he still had that strange energy weapon he retrieved from the _Firestorm_. He had used it on some Covenant troops on his way over, and it was surprisingly effective for such a small weapon. It fired concentrated beams much like a Covenant beam sniper rifle, and can take out an Elite's shield in one shot.

…that being said, he still didn't like the 'feel' of it, it was basically a handle as the whole weapon. Having spent years training with UNSC-grade weapons and Covenant weapons, he expects most weapons to share the same characteristics, but this… _phaser_ he recalled the guard saying before knocking him out, didn't feel like the usual weapons he handles. It felt… awkward, for a lack of a better description.

But, as long as it kills Covenant he could care less as he holstered the pistol, and walking outside the building. The Rally Point was the Quezon spaceport, and the UNSC personnel have set up what defenses they could around the _St. Elizabeth_ to protect it, all while civilians flooded inside - seeing the old colony ship as their only means of surviving this mess. They were able to set up a choke point for the Covenant. The Engineers managed to get the AA batteries of the ship working to dissuade any air assaults, so that meant the Covenant could only approach on foot. And there was only one way to get to the Spaceport by foot - the bridge.

While they would give them one hell of a fight, Jaden doubted that they were going to survive this mess. If they were lucky the _St. Elizabeth_ might get the civilians out if the engineers are as good as they claim to be, but the troops? They'll all die keeping them safe for as long as possible.

To make it count.

' _Guess it's better than dying alone..._ ' Jaden thought, as he headed towards the barricade set up by the UNSC forces.

The Marines nearly dropped their guns at seeing a Spartan approach their position. "Hot damn! Another Spartan! Let him through; CO's gonna want to speak with him!" Jaden had no clue what was going on, but he was going to find out as the Marines let him through.

* * *

"That is an insane sight." While not as powerful as purpose-built telescopes, field glasses worked well enough in darkened skies to see into space. And the highest ranking UNSC officer was watching a ship beat the crap out of an ENTIRE FLEET of Covenant warships and survive without a scratch.

"Insane? More like _glorious_." Major Gregory Tarkov laughed as he looked up at space, looking at the ruined ships in orbit as the Covenant retreated. "It's about damn time the Covies got _their_ asses handed to them on a silver platter!"

"What ship _is_ that though?" A woman's voice spoke, coming from a figure in CQC MJOLNIR armor. "It doesn't look UNSC… "

"Spartan, I could care _less_ so long as they keep that shit up against the Split chins!" Tarkov smirked. "We might make it out of this thing alive afteral!" The door opening had him look back, as another Spartan entered the room. "Well, another Spartan! My day just keeps getting better and better!"

Jaden spared a glance around the room, aside from the other ODST's in the room, he quickly spotted three other Spartans in the room - one in CQC armor, another clad in Operator armor, and a third in EOD armor. He recognized each of them as fellow SPARTAN-III's. "What's going on?" He asked.

Tarkov chuckled, handing him the binoculars "Look up there," he pointed up at space "The Covies got their asses _handed_ to them by some new ship!"

Jaden's eyes widened as he took the binoculars and looked up. And sure enough, everything he saw on the ship, in the escape pod… it was all right up there in space, ruined wrecks of Covenant ships littering the space above, with a single oddly shaped starship cruising around. ' _It was… real?_ '

"That thing looks like a flyin' saucer attached to a big-ass engineering section, but it's got REALLY powerful guns! Fuckin' Covies couldn't _touch_ that paintjob, and from what we can see, it's human!" Jaden zoomed in with the field glasses, putting them to their absolute limit. On the underside of the saucer were letters and numbers: NCC-94517-A. In English.

Near the glowing dome at the center of the saucer was a name: _Ra Cailum_.

If his memory were clear, that was Egyptian: some town or another. Didn't matter, because Jaden was kicking himself in the ass. These people saved his life, and WHAT does he do? Break out, label them Innies and hurt a lot of people who didn't deserve it.

"Major! We're getting a call from the UNSC _Saratoga_!"

"And news just keeps getting better!" Tarkov smirked as he picked up the radio. "This is Major Tarkov, of the 19th Shock Troops battalion, damn good to hear from you _Saratoga_!"

" _And you, Major._ " Came the voice of the _Saratoga's_ Captain. " _We've… made some new friends up here. Stand by, you'll be getting some help soon._ "

"Help?"

" _Hoi-oh, assholes!_ "

The new and unknown male voice made all of them jump. "The hell are you?"

" _Captain Ronald Pinkerton of the United Federation of Planets Starship_ Ra Cailum _! And in about five minutes, your asses will be FLOODED with shuttles carrying medical supplies, doctors and a LOT of engineers. Consider your asses lucky my ship is an_ Odyssey _-Class starship assigned to the Starfleet Corps of Engineers; I got a LOT of bored engineering personnel._ "

Tarkov blinked, before shaking his head "I have no idea what half of that meant, but we'll take all the help we can get," he said. "Especially if they can help our engineer boys get the _St. Elizabeth_ ready!"

" _The Colony Ship?_ " Drake asked.

"Engineers hatched a harebrained scheme to fix up that old museum to be space worthy again," Tarkov informed. "We're evacuating as many people onboard as we can, but until you… Federation guys showed up, I didn't think this thing had a chance in hell of working!"

" _Rocks to replicators, every time. First flight of shuttlecraft launching now. Oh, and if you shoot at them...They're all armed, and you do NOT want to piss off my chief engineer. She gets creative when she gets mad._ "

Tarkov didn't want to know, Jaden probably had a good idea as he spotted a flight of shuttles leaving the massive starship.

* * *

 **Meanwhile - UNSC _Saratoga_**

 **Briefing Room**

* * *

"Well, you've likely just became the best friend of any remaining UNSC forces on the planet," Drake informed Ron as they sat in the briefing room. "Though I must ask… what will you do once you're finished here?"

"Well, my duty is to my crew. As soon as we've gotten your people off Reach, we're leaving. My assistant chief engineer is fixing our modified FTL drive, and maybe return home. Your ships will be able to return to Earth as soon as Sonja makes sure you won't explode mid-flight."

"Assuming they let us," Drake shrugged, causing Ron to raise an eyebrow. "Cole Protocol - a ship is not permitted to plot a direct or indirect route to Earth or her colonies to avoid enemy ships from finding Earth or other inner colonies. On top of that, even if we did that, odds are the people will get sent to anywhere _but_ the Inner colonies, and direct them to mass refugee worlds… as far as Earth and the colonies closest to her are concerned, we're winning the war… when in truth we haven't won a major battle since the Harvest campaign back in 2525… and that took five years to get her back."

He then chuckled "Hell, I'm breaking the Protocol right now just talking to you, letting you on my ship without deleting the NAV database," he said. "Knowing how religious ONI is about it, they won't care if you know where Earth is or not."

"ONI? I presume that means Office of Naval Intelligence."

"That was quick."

"I'm from Earth, and I'm a student of history; there's been at least three organizations named that. Well, I'm not willing to see people get shafted for circumstances out of their control. Though Starfleet Command is going to have my head for breaking the Prime Directive after I get back home, so I'll give you an offer."

"An offer, Captain?"

"I grant you and your people asylum, and you can come with us. Has to be better than anywhere ONI would send you."

Drake paused, thinking about that offer "Hm… you may be right," he said, "I'd say you'd have trouble convincing the civilians, but… after what you just did, you proved you can protect them a million times better the UNSC ever could."

"And the A.I?" Ron asked, "What was her name, Astarte?"

"She isn't an official UNSC AI," Drake shrugged "The original A.I of the _Saratoga_ enacted the Cole Protocol and flatlined itself, Astarte is my personal AI who took a… let's say crash course on how to function her. She won't be a problem… well, for a few more years I suppose…"

Ron rose his eyebrow, and Drake continued "I don't know if you have this same issue with AI's back in your world, but in ours…" he began. "Since AI's like Astarte are created after flash cloned or recovered brainwaves from humans, they have a life expectancy of seven years… after eight, they enter what we call Rampancy, where they literally start thinking themselves to death, letting emotions and thoughts take control…"

"We don't have that problem; few of our ships have actual AIs; usually they're all VIs. But I think I can help 'er: AI programming is something of a hobby of mine. Although you're going to have to tell her to stop bugging my ship."

Drake chuckled. "Ah, she's just curious about you and all." He said, "Told her not to try and hack into anything that'd make you… _angry_."

* * *

Astarte wanted to know more about this superdreadnought, so she figured she'd try to access the ship's memory core. Instead, she ran into… her.

"Dear, you're starting to make me mad. And I kill things that try to break into my ship's computers." She wore the same uniform as the captain, and looked like stereotypical Egyptian royalty with a hint of Greek. And she looked livid.

"Oh! Uhhh, sorry…" Astate said, taken aback by her sudden appearance in cyberspace before her. "I… didn't know the _Ra Cailum_ had a shipboard AI… I was just, ahhhh… ummm… geez this is embarrassing…"

"Curious? Very well. I'll contact my captain. It's a good thing he and I are on… familiar terms." Astarte saw the exotic and exotic-looking AI smirk like a cat who got to drink her milk and eat the cinary all the time.

" _Pinkerton here. What's up, Cass?_ "

"Just our friendly AI trying to get into our computers."

" _We want to know more about them and vice versa. I'll talk to her captain, so don't do anything unbecoming._ "

The AI nodded before the link shut off, before looking at Astarte "Well, I believe introductions are in order, then," she said. "I am Cassandra Ptolemy, of the USS _Ra Cailum_ … and you are…?"

"Oh! I'm, I am UNSC A.I ATE-1940-3184, Astarte," The Smart A.I informed, before blinking "You… have a _last_ name?"

"Of course. I'm a Starfleet officer and Federation citizen, as provided by the Artificial Lifeform Recognition Act of 2365. I chose my surname based on my captain's ancestor's command: the USS _Ptolemaeus_. And my appearance… you can guess." A stereotypical depiction of Cleopatra.

Sad; in reality, the last true pharaoh of Egypt wasn't really that pretty.

"If you like, I can show you our historical records."

"Oh, of course!" Astarte nodded. "From what I've heard from our captain's before the isolated themselves in the briefing room, you sound as though you're from an alternate universe! I'm curious to see how you achieved technology like… _this_." However she paused when she recalled something else she said, "Wait… you're an officer _and_ citizen?"

Cassie blinked. "Yes… aren't you in the UNSC?" she asked

"Well… not really," Astarte shrugged. "Sure we're treated as ones, but… there aren't any laws specifically saying AI's are actual citizens - let alone officers of starships… we're just hardware really… doesn't really matter since most AI like me only live for about seven years before we think ourselves to death - literally. "

"Hmm. I can fix that."

* * *

It took a second for the humor to wear off before Drake asked a complicated question. "Wait, you can communicate with your AI without talking?"

"I have a subspace transceiver in my upper spinal column. It comes in handy for silent communications and quick updates."

Drake rose an eyebrow. "Is that a… common, augmentation from where you're from?" he asked.

"I was kidnapped by a group of cybernetically-enhanced genocidal monsters, forcibly added to their collective and given modifications against my will," Ron shrugged. "The kicker? If anyone tries to remove them, I will die. So I figured 'what the hell, they're stuck in me, so why not put them to good use?' after modding the shit out of them."

Drake got the idea that was the ABRIDGED version of what happened to him. "... I see I've got a _lot_ of reading to do on your universe's history…" he said.

"400 years worth, Captain."

* * *

 **Near UNSC _St. Elizabeth_**

* * *

A shuttle approached the site, hovering downwards. It had a curved hull, red...things on the two nacelles and was smaller than a Pelican.

But it turned like a Longsword. Jaden was a fighter pilot, and if that thing handled like a fighter and had the same weapons that ship had…

Oh, boy the Covies would be FUCKED.

As the first shuttle set down, its ramp opened, and the man with the sword and Larcei's mother were first to emerge - and Jaden could spot the matching bands of gold on their right ring fingers.

It didn't take him long to put two and two together from what Larcei told him.

' _Shit, now I gotta make nice with 'em…_ ' he groaned, remembering how he… _reacted_ when he woke up on his ship. ' _Just… stick to the background… don't draw attention to yourself…_ ' Jaden was _very_ glad he was wearing the MJOLNIR Helmet, and the armor didn't look a thing like his old Mark V(B) armor. Hopefully they don't recognize him… for now…

"That is the most screwy shuttle I've EVER seen!" Major Tarkov said as he walked up towards the new visitors.

"The Type-7's a rare one nowadays, but the Captain's got his ways of getting high-grade shuttlecraft." Larcei's mother spoke, "I'm Lt. Commander Lunamaria Yamato, security team lead on the _Ra Cailum_. This is my husband Takeshi, the XO of the big ship and commander of the _Firestorm_."

"Major Gregory Tarkov, 19th Shock Troops Battalion, ODST's." The ODST replied, giving her a quick salute. "Damn fine work your people did up in orbit, I hope you kick just as much split chin ass down here as you do up there though."

"We haven't faced them on the ground yet," Takeshi admitted. "But I'm certainly looking forward to seeing how well we do." He then drew his blade. "I'm especially wondering how a Tritanium monomolecular katana will fare."

"What's the situation here, Major?" Luna asked.

"Bad, but it could've been worse." Tarkov admitted, "We managed to get the AA guns on the _St. Elizabeth_ working, so the Covies won't be coming in by air, so we were able to set up a choke point on the bridge separating the space port from the rest of the city - we're using it to bring in as many civilians as we can while the engineers work on getting the slipspace drive and engines working, and praying to whatever deities that the Covies don't decide to say fuck it and glass this whole area."

"Troop strength?"

"Me and my boys in the 19th took casualties when the fight began, but we're still mostly good to go." Tarkov nodded, "We've got a few squads of Army troops, half a platoon of Marines and about a dozen or so Warthogs, with one Scorpion Tank. We also got a few SPARTAN's too." Tarkov gestured over to where Jaden was, along with the other Spartans near him.

"Spartans?"

"What, you don't know about them?"

"Alternate universe, Major," Takeshi explained. "And the one we rescued called himself a Spartan before launching an escape pod out of my ship. Don't blame him for not trusting us, but I WOULD like a bit of an apology for him beating the crap out of my own first officer… and the medical staff."

Jaden gulped slightly ' _Fuuuuuck…._ '

"If you find him, sure - but right now I need this ship _flyable_ ASAFP," Tarkov said. "If you got engineers who know how to fix ships, send em to engineering! My boys need all the help we can get!"

"THAT…" Another woman with oily, messy black hair emerged from the shuttle, playing with a combat knife. "Would be me. Lt. Commander Sonja Henderson, chief engineer of the big fucking ship in orbit. Which I also helped design. Show me a problem, I can fix it in a matter of minutes. Impossible? Couple of hours."

Tarkov and his fellows looked to Sonja's superiors. "She's not joking. She once powered a phaser array using compressed air. We REALLY don't want to know how she did that."

"…Captain, she could make a nuclear bomb out of grass and milk, I don't give a flying fuck as long as she gets this ship flying." Tarkov informed.

"Did that; the Iconians got REALLY mad afterwards." The engineer walked past them as they STARED at her. "She made a nuke out of-"

"Don't. Ask. Our crew's known for two things: personal problems and REALLY insane stuff."

"…I'm LIKING your crew, Commander!"

Takeshi chuckled slightly, as he glanced at the Spartans. The armor certainly looked fairly intimidating… but his eyes drifted to one in particular… the only one who seemed to be armed with a Type-2 Phaser. He smiled slightly as he approached the Spartan, who seemed to tense as he approached.

"So… believe us now?" Takeshi asked the Spartan.

The Spartan paused, before he let out a groan. "Yeah… I do," he muttered. "Fuck… geez, I don't… I… uhh… damnit… "

"It's fine," Takeshi replied. "Next time, though, just… try to _think_ a bit more before you act. I know I tend not to do that a lot, myself, and get into plenty of trouble for it. As a wise man in the 21st century said, 'think, then act; don't act, then think'. Ron's had to drill that lesson into my head a lot."

"I… understand…" Jaden sighed. "Again, Uhh… sorry…"

Takeshi smiled. "Just be thankful you weren't in the _Ra Cailum's_ sickbay," he said. "Rutia can be an absolute terror."

"I've… gotten that impression from what I've heard."

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: Oh, yes, Rutia is the Retsu Unohana of STO.**

 **I almost wonder if the Yulanra Symbiont's first host was a savage swordmaster, like Unohana was originally the first Kenpachi?**

 **Ron the True Fan: (Gets looks for answers) I am NOT answering that. On that note, may the Odyssey (ship and story) continue.**

 **117Jorn: Until Next time…**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**


	5. Chapter 5

**117jorn: Hey everyone! Another week, another update for the Odyssey!**

* * *

 **August 31th, 2553 AD, Epsilon Eridani System**

 **USS _Firestorm_ \- Docked with USS _Ra Cailum_**

* * *

Mogire sighed, pressing the ice bag against her forehead. "And I thought _Klingons_ punched hard…" she groaned, glancing at Brok'Tan - who was having his arm tended to. "No offense, Brok."

"Non-taken," the Klingon grunted, as one of the doctors treated his broken arm. "That man moved faster than any human _I_ know… it was almost like fighting Pinkerton."

"An experience no one wants to go through. The commander always said Ron aced the unconventional combat courses for a reason."

While Sonja and her crews were on the ground (giving the UNSC people the shock of their lives with the sight of aliens working in harmony with humans) Rutia and Mogire were going to be dealing with the medical situation: already, the CMO was organizing teams to beam down.

Mogire, meanwhile… had to deal with the aftermath of Jaden's escape.

"I guess we should count our blessings that he held back at least," she sighed. "He could've killed everyone in the room…"

"Ummm… yeah, uh, sorry about that…" Mogire, Brok, and the other medical staff all looked towards the door, as the man who easily kicked their asses was standing there now, along with Takeshi. The former looking rather… sheepish.

"I guess he finally listened to reason?" Mogire asked.

"Pretty much, yeah," Takeshi replied.

"Again, I'm… sorry about what… happened," Jaden said, glancing at the Klingon. "Our… only form of alien contact has been with a race that… kills any human they see…"

"So we have discovered," Brok'Tan replied. "While I can grant that my people have been at odds with the Federation at various points across our history, the same could be said for any of our neighbors, to be honest - we Klingons are a warrior race, seeking honor and glory in battle. Some of us, like myself, have seen the honor in aiding the Federation directly, as members of Starfleet."

"You didn't kill any of us, so no harm, no foul." Mogire said, "Besides, if you did, if Takeshi didn't kill you, our captain would've. And he's almost exactly like you."

That got Jaden's attention. "Like me?"

"He's been… augmented, but to a much, MUCH greater degree."

"Was he augmented when he was 12 too?" Jaden asked, blinking "I'm surprised there are SPARTAN's in your universe too."

"No, but I think he got it worse by getting assimilated, losing his individuality and getting hooked into a hive mind, having half his brain scooped out and replaced with a computer, only to get knocked free nine years later by a photon grenade." Mogire paused for a second. "Wait, you got that crap put in you when you were a kid? No wonder you're so fucked up."

Jaden was a bit perplexed at the 'half a brain' part, but saved that info for later. "Fucked… up?" he asked. "That's kinda the only way to do it, plus the five years of training pre-augmentation."

Takeshi was the first to put it together. "Wait…" he said. "You were augmented at twelve… five years of traini—you started training at **_seven years old?!_** "

"Well… yeah," Jaden shrugged. "So were the other 600 SPARTAN's in Alpha and Beta companies… well, 915 if we include Gamma back home, but they're still being trained post-augmentation. And so were the 75 SPARTAN-II's from what the LT said."

Mogire had clasped her hands over her mouth in horror, the ice pack falling unattended to the floor. Brok'Tan looked like he wanted to beat someone to death. Takeshi's left hand was clenching and unclenching around the handle of his katana. "Pray that we don't meet whoever was behind these programs," he said in a tone approximating a growl. "Using child soldiers… I don't care how desperate a situation might be, that is just barbaric."

"Have you ever lost someone close to you, Captain?"

Takeshi blinked, looking at Jaden. "Excuse me?"

"Have you ever lost someone you cared deeply about?" Jaden asked, with a rather stoic face. "Let me tell you this… I _volunteered_ to be a Spartan, so did Alpha, Beta and Gamma Companies. We lost all of our families to the Covenant, as they glassed world after world. They slaughter our fleets in space, nearly dominating us on the ground… unlike in your universe, we are at war with virtually every alien species we know of, who has every advantage over us."

"The SPARTAN Program is literally the only reason mankind still stands to this day," he continued, staring Takeshi down. "If it weren't for Spartan's like the Master Chief, the II's or Alpha and Beta companies, mankind would be extinct by now - and you would be saving tombstones. We joined because we wanted to make it count, we wanted to stop the Covenant, and prevent worlds from being glassed like Harvest, Jericho VII, New London, Biko, Endymion, and hundreds more, killing billions of more people…."

Takeshi settled down a bit at that. "Alright, message received," he said. "Still, we've had a few issues in our past that leave us… rather wary on the subjects of child soldiers and augmentation. Do you still have that copy of our historical documents?"

"Yes… you mean these Augments like that… Khan guy?" Jaden asked, shaking his head. "We're not like him, or those like him. SPARTAN's allegiance is to humanity, the UNSC, and to each other. Nothing more, nothing less."

" _The Project Chrysalis people said the same thing, kid, and look what happened._ "

Jaden looked around, finding nothing that could've spoken. "Where—"

" _I'm not even_ on board _, boy. Captain Ronald Pinkerton, at your service. I'm using that computer in my brain to jack into the comms. Give the Borg this, they know how to pervert and enhance technology past their limits. I suggest you get out of that armor; my CMO wants to look at those augmentations, and as she's busy, Mogire's going to do most of the scanning._ "

Jaden narrowed his eyes. "SPARTAN Augmentations are classified," he informed.

"Kid, I think it's best if you do what he says," Takeshi replied. "Rutia… well, did they have a cartoon in the 21st century of your world named _Bleach_?" At a nod from Jaden, Takeshi asked, "Have you watched that cartoon at all?" Another, more tentative, nod. "Well, think Retsu Unohana turned up to about 20 or so and you have Rutia Yulanra in a nutshell."

"…She could be Yuno fucking Gasai for all I care, I'm not going to just let you 'look' at classified UNSC augmentation!" Jaden retorted.

" _You want me to call her and tell her that the idiot wants to keep all the problems, or should I, Take?_ "

"You're the one with the subspace transceiver embedded in your head. And you're the only one that DOESN'T fear her."

That actually caught Jaden's attention. "Problems?"

" _The few tricorder scans we DID take of you showed a few… problems. Even Augments in the 21st Century didn't have those problems. The Doc wants to take more detailed scans to see if we can fix what those butchers intentionally fucked up while keeping all the bonuses._ "

So they were trying to help. Jaden closed his eyes, mentally debating how fucked he would be if ONI found out about this… but if they _could_ help…

He groaned "Alright, fine," he relented. "But if ONI finds out about this, I'm screwed."

"Who the hell is ONI?" Mogire asked.

" _Office of Naval Intelligence. They're assholes, from what Cap't Drake tells me. So… fuck them. They try to touch you, they die. Repeatedly._ "

Jaden looked at Takeshi for clarification.

"You don't want to know. Trust me."

* * *

 **Meanwhile - UNSC _St. Elizabeth_**

* * *

"Alright, so what I'm gonna do is add a primary particle deflector modulator, and connect it to the subspace flux cells I installed earlier," Sonja said as she ran her tricorder along the inner workings of the colossal starship. "That should give this old ship a degree of shielding against Covenant plasma weapons from what I've read up on them on the way down here. I'd add phaser banks, but we don't have the time for that - right now we focus on defenses and engines. Seems like you use a version of Quantum Slipstream, only it's easier to build, albeit with inaccuracies. But I can make due, just called in some parts from the ship, should be able to get her ready for jumps soon - engines are almost complete."

The UNSC personnel stared at Sonja as though she was a goddess. In a way? She kinda was. An engineering one, at least. She walked in, took a look around and got to work, ignoring all of their protests as the ship became alive once more.

She was also REALLY pretty. But they weren't saying anything about that with those knives of hers; that thing cut through an inch and a half of titanium-A like it was paper.

"Uh, Commander?"

Sonja looked at one of the female engineers, who was blushing up a storm. "Yeah?"

"Will you marry me?"

"Tempting, but I only got one man in mind for me," Sonja replied, smirked as she tapped her commbadge. "Henderson to Big Boss."

Ron's voice groaned through the open link. " _I thought I told you to stop calling me that; the entire crew's doing it thanks to you!_ "

"But it's so fitting," Sonja chuckled. "Anyways, we're well underway with this thing's refit. I would like to overhaul this whole ship with some Tritanium - Titanium A only works so well, but we don't have time for that, I gamble. Engines themselves are almost good, just starting work on this ship's… what's it called again?"

"Slipspace Drive!"

"Yeah, Slipspace Drive," she continued. "Anyways, I should have her space worthy within a few more hours - she's a big ass ship after all. Anyways, I need ya to beam down parts, I need a dynamic deflector matrix for shields, and an isolinear pulse modulator to fix the Slipspace Drive itself."

" _We've got crates of the stuff: we're SCE, remember?_ " Overpacked and over prepared were the SCE's watchwords. In point of fact, the Ra Cailum had TWO Saber-Class starships, disassembled, of course, in two cargo bays. They had the equipment to build whatever they needed and to make whatever they needed to build whatever they needed.

They were completely self-sufficient. And as Ron was usually talking with Cassie whenever he was using that implant (there was a SLIGHT vocal distortion) she didn't bother tapping the badge again. "Sure! Beam it down, Cass!"

" _Locking on. Energizing._ "

There was a brief flash of light on the floor, before several crates of equipment appeared, causing all of the UNSC personnel to jump.

"What the fuck?!"

"Transporter technology. What, never seen a quantum displacement field teleport one object from one place to another before? Seriously, the Covenant's gotta have shit like this."

They all shook their heads.

"Fuck me, we've had this shit for over 250 years and we find a universe that technologically REGRESSED?! Boss, if you're still listening—"

" _Yes, yes, that still of yours is working overtime and I'll add the finishing touches to make it whatever the hell you like. Be thankful I got brewery knowledge form the Borg, too. WHY they saved that, I'll never know._ "

"Thank you. Henderson out." She turned the commbadge off before looking around. "What are ya'll looking for? An engraved invitation? Get this stuff moving! We aren't getting paid by the hour here!"

"Didn't you guys say you had a moneyless economy?"

"We're in your universe now. Now get moving before I sic Rutia on you!" The threat of the doctor was more than enough to get them moving.

They'd seen what she did to Major Tarkov. And seeing him reduced to a state of fear was…

Well. You get the idea.

* * *

 ** _CAS_** **-Class Assault Carrier _Seeker of Truth_**

* * *

Like a white-gray monster of old, the _Ra Cailum_ orbited Reach, just out of reach by the Covenant armada.

Out of the ship's reach, at least: that thing's weapons range was limited only by the fact they were nearly on the opposite side of the planet!

Thel did NOT want to see that ship up close EVER AGAIN. Though he had a feeling that he was about to.

" _You say ONE ship caused this much damage?_ " The Prophet of Regret asked, looking at the reports of the battle. " _This is absurd!_ "

" _And yet the recordings do not lie…_ " The Prophet of Mercy said, scratching his chin. " _The Vermin… they have quite the ship now…_ "

"I do not believe the humans built it, noble prophets." Thel spoke, "Its design is unlike those of any human vessel we have ever encountered. While it may have a human crew, it must not have been made by them."

" _Reguardless, we cannot ignore it._ " the Prophet of Truth informed, " _That being said though, we have another assignment for you, Supreme Commander._ "

"A new assignment?" Thel asked, the Sangheili sounding confused.

The Prophet smiled. " _You were wise to send your fleet to follow the human ship that escaped, Commander,_ " he said. " _For by following it… they found Halo._ "

Thel's eyes widened. Halo… one of the Sacred Rings… they found one…

" _The human ship crash landed on the ring, and they dare to desecrate it with their filthy footsteps,_ " the Prophet of Regret informed. " _You and your fleet is being retasked to the defense of the sacred ring, and the extermination of the vermin who dare set foot upon it. The Great Journey is nearly upon us, Commander… do not fail us._ "

"I will not." Thel bowed his head, "But… what of the Human ship here?"

" _We will have Chieftan Goalith engage with it with his own forces,_ " Truth informed.

Thel let out a silent growl. He did not like the idea of the Brutes attempting to attack the human ship… but on the flip side if his fleet could not best the human ships now, neither could the Brute's. If nothing else, they would pay for denying R'tas his chance for slaying a Demon. "Understood," he nodded. "I shall prepare all the ships under my command, and proceed to Halo's location."

* * *

 **Meanwhile - USS _Firestorm_**

 **Sick Bay**

* * *

Jaden had no idea what those… tricorders were doing. They weren't even TOUCHING his body; how could they get any sort of data?

"Hmm… You've got an implant in your thyroid, explains a few things. Skeleton is reinforced… If it weren't for the fact that he outclasses you, I'd say you were a match for the captain."

"Define 'outclassed'."

"His skeleton is a LOT tougher than yours. Yours is reinforced with something about .75 diamond hardness."

"And?"

Mogire gave him a smile. "His is reinforced with something 21.8 times harder than diamond."

"…fuck me…" Jaden groaned. "What is _with_ you people?"

"I could ask the same for you," Mogire said. "These augmentations are dangerous, and have probably KILLED people. The captain at least has an excuse."

Jaden scoffed. "What excuse is that?"

"That it was forced on me." The sickbay doors opened, revealing a man a little shorter then Jaden at 6'4, joined by a woman a head shorter with spots running down the sides of her head. "I was forced into the Borg Collective against my will, subjected to experiments that would make your augmentations look tame and I haven't even had time to fully RECOVER from nine years connected to a hive mind. You volunteered, to the best of my knowledge, although being seven years old may have had something to do with the lack of rational thinking."

Jaden was taken aback a bit by this 'Borg' he mentioned, before shaking his head. "Me and every other SPARTAN-III was orphaned by the war," he said. "We had no more families, no future… the SPARTAN program gave us a chance to fight back. Because of us and the SPARTAN-II's, there still _is_ a humanity around."

"I'm not standing here because I want to have a lively conversation about moral ethics," Ron informed. "I have those with my ship's AI every time I go into a regeneration alcove. I'm here because my doctor decided to fix the screwups that were done to you without removing the benefits, and she needs my help doing it. So, I suggest you lay down and let Rutia do her job so you can get back to yours as quickly as possible. You don't want to be on my ship, I want you back on the ground with your people. Let's make this quick and painless, shall we?"

Jaden sighed "Alright, fine." He said, "Let's just get this over with. How do we do this?"

"You lay down, my doctor does her job—"

" _Bridge to captain._ "

The man groaned in annoyance. "WHAT?!"

" _Someone needs to take his happy pills._ "

"I'm not in the mood, Corpsa! Spit it out!"

" _Ok, then. There's a large force heading toward the colony ship and I don't think they're going there for a kabuki showing._ "

The captain facepalmed before pointing at Rutia. "I need to limit Sonja's influence on my crew," he grumbled. "You, fix him. I'm going down there."

"I should head down-" Jaden began to say, but Rutia put a hand on his shoulder.

"Don't worry," she assured. "Ron will help your forces down there, we need to take care of your augments right now."

"But I-"

"Don't. _Worry_."

"…you know you're freaky when you do that eye-smile thing, right?"

"So I've been told. Sit."

* * *

 **Meanwhile - on the surface**

* * *

"Here they come!"

The UNSC Marines all manned the barricade, rifles, and launchers at the ready. In the distance they could already make out the sight of the approaching Covenant vehicles and infantry. Grunts up first, everything else pulling up the rear.

That reminded Takeshi and Luna of the Heralds in a way: they sent in the weak drones first. But unlike the Heralds, the Covenant sucked at dealing with sustained energy weapons, as the few phaser turrets they'd set up were downing the grunts like they were flies hitting a windshield.

"It's like they've never heard of personal shielding!" Takeshi remarked. "Or, if they have it, it's extremely weak!"

"Grunts don't usually get shields!" one of the Marines shouted over the weapons fire. "That's usually for the split lips and Jackals!"

Thumps were heard as photonic explosives landed on the Covenant forces heading for the bridge, sending them flying everywhere with every charge. "The fuck was that?!"

"Photon mortars! Sonja must be pulling out all the stops!"

A hum was heard from above as a purple craft entered view. "Son of a—BANSHEE!" The Banshee fired its' fuel rod cannon, impacting the ground near the mortar positions, only to receive fire from MACO security teams.

It tried to fly low to the ground, to provide difficulties for aiming, but as it flew overhead, Takeshi leapt up and used his katana to slice off a wing.

The Banshee flew into the ground, exploding before plasma rained on their heads. "Fuckin' Wraiths! We're gonna have ground troops pour in like piss in a toilet!"

Crude, but Marines weren't accused of having dirty mouths for a reason. "We got ground forces heading our way; they're using the plasma to cover their advance! I hope you got something that'll kill these assholes!"

"There's Sonja, but… Yeah, let's not go there. I STILL don't know where she keeps all those knives."

"Neither do I," Takeshi admitted. "I mean, I have my suspicions that she has some sort of personal replicator system that she designed and built herself, but I've never been able to confirm them."

A brute managed to get into their line before a large knife lodged itself in its' head. This was followed by many more knives, which impacted the chest, head and legs before it fell over. "One bloody day, Commander, and WHAT do you make me do?" A VERY large knife lodged itself near Takeshi's foot, and the XO realized quickly that his chief engineer was mad.

"I hope those knives are good against those!" A Marine shouted, as speeding down the bridge was a trio of Ghost's, along with a Specter, and a Wraith which began lobbing Plasma mortars towards them. "DUCK!"

Sonja tapped a key on her armband, putting up a set of cover shields. "That won't last long! Mortars, triangulate fire on the following—"

Sonja didn't finish when she saw a shape materialize on top of one of the Wraiths before drawing a sword, hacking off the plasma cannon and drawing it through the entire tank, jumping off before it exploded.

"What the fuck was that?!"

Takeshi and Luna smirked. "THAT… was our captain."

* * *

Borg enhancements helped keep Ron alive as another Wraith fired its' plasma cannon at him, his modified personal shields tanking a single round before his reactive Borg shielding kicked in. "You people SUCK!" Another round hit Ron, doing jack shit as he ran towards the tank, jumping onto it.

The Grunt gunner fired the plasma cannon turret at him, but the Borg shields absorbed it all before Ron grabbed the Grunt by the head and tossed him up in the air. He then grabbed the cockpit hatch with his hands and proceeded to rip it open. The Elite inside however saw this coming, and Ron ducked just in time to avoid being stabbed by an energy sword.

"Finally! A challenge that DOESN'T come from Take!" Ron drew his sword once again, having sheathed the weapon to begin fighting the Sangheili (a WONDERFUL name for a species, in Ron's opinion; it sounded majestic) on equal terms.

"Demon! You insult me!"

"How? I'm not wearing armor and we're both using melee weapons."

"You will DIE!" Ron's weapon impacted the hard-light sword, the nature of the Type-1 energy sword counteracting the monomolecular edge of Ron's kilij. The larger alien swung at Ron with his free hand, but Ron's Borg enhancements allowed him to both catch and better yet hold his ground against the superior foe.

"Huh. We're both alike. I like that!" he kicked the Elite, forcing him back. "I don't fight fair, either!"

In a spar, Ron would always lose. In regulated combat, bound by rules and laws, Takeshi would easily beat Ron into the ground.

In actual combat…Ron would kick Takeshi's ass. It would take a fair bit of time and doing, but there was only one rule in real war: survive. Takeshi was a bit stiff in the terms of swordplay, though it was masterful. Ron was unpredictable, using his kilij like a club in one moment and like an axe the next, only to use actual swordplay when you least expect it.

In short, he fought like someone would fight the Borg in ship-to-ship combat: randomly. Didn't help that he WAS Borg at one point, so he knew EXACTLY how to do it.

The Sangheili let out a roar as he charged at Ron once again, sword in hand, swinging it as Ron dodged - getting a closer look at it. The blade itself was actually rather ingenious in design, two blades with a gap in the center, making it perfect for sliding an enemy's sword within, and with a simple twist a user could disarm their opponent.

"Die, demon!"

"I have no intention, my friend." He transferred all power to his personal shields, grabbing the sword before kicking the Sangheili off the tank, knocking the Elite out. "My tank now!"

Ron chuckled madly as he hopped into the tank, resealing the hatch behind him. "Simple enough controls…" he said. "What does this button-" He pressed the button, and suddenly the entire tank sped forward in a burst of speed, slamming into a Ghost "-WHOA!"

The covenant were not ready for this, so they decided to try and stop Ron before he figured out how to drive it, as plasma fire rained on the tank. "Well, hate to say it, but I don't play by your rules." He extended his old assimilation tubules, sticking them into the frame of the tank. "Borg tech, do your thing."

Another Plasma mortar hit the Wraith, but rather than impacting against the armor, a shimmering shield appeared around the Tank, before Ron's Wraith returned fire with a green ball of plasma, which burned away the offending Wraith. The gun turret on top then began moving without an operator, as it opened fire on the incoming infantry.

"That's right; I'm a one-man tank operator!" A Banshee fired at the Wraith, plasma pinging off the Borg-installed shields. "Ooh. I like the idea of air support." He set the tank to remote operation, then climbed out before the Banshee made another pass at him.

Ron then jumped onto the Banshee's wing, laughing all the way. For those who don't know what's about to happen, someone's going to hit the ground very, VERY hard.

The cockpit opened, and Ron pulled the brute pilot out, who screamed before he was vaporized by the Borg Wraith, followed by Ron hijacking the aircraft, adding the Borg touch to it, then bailing out. "Pinkerton to Yamato: You're welcome."

" _Nice work, Ron,_ " Takeshi replied. " _Too bad you can't make the vehicles do the whole assimilation thing on your own - you could have a whole fleet at your command then._ "

"Do NOT tempt me. Tarkov, this is Captain Pinkerton; my… new vehicles will aid your forces in driving the Covenant off."

"How the… That's fuckin' nuts! How the hell are you driving those things at the same time?!"

"Borg implants and a very powerful computer." Ron then spotted the Elite he kicked out of his new tank, who was getting up.

One of the Marines pumped their Shotgun "I've got this one," he said, approaching the Elite before it can get back up.

Ron placed his kilij on top of the M45's barrel before slowly drawing it back, cutting into the weapon's internal structure, making it useless. "That's enough."

"What the hell are you doing?!"

"I have a better idea." Ron looked to the Elite. "Get up. Run. Tell your superiors what happened today. Tell them that there is a nightmare waiting for them should they attack this place again."

The Elite growled, before glancing around at the destruction that had been caused around them. "… We _will_ meet again… Demon." He growled out, before he stepped back.

"I'll be wait-" Ron began to say, before the Marine clubbed him in the back of the head with his shotgun. "OW! Wha the fuck?!"

"YOU RUINED MY SHOTGUN YOU ASSHOLE!" The Marine shouted.

"So? Deal with it. Hit me again, and it won't be pretty."

"Fine!" The Man shouted, but it took two other Marines to stop him from smashing his weapon against him again.

"Sarge! Stop! It's not worth it!" One shouted.

"Damnit Simons! This is a matter of honor!" The Sergeant shouted, trying to wrestle out of their grasp. "This bastard broke a bond of man and killing machine!"

Ron ignored the marines in favor of heading back to the _St. Elizabeth_. "Sonja, I'd love a status report."

The hispanic woman pulled the last of her knives out of the brute she killed before turning to the higher ranking officer. "It'll take a couple of hours, sir, but she'll fly," she informed. "I'll need another power source to get this thing in the air."

"We downed a Covenant _SDV_ -Class heavy corvette that's more or less in one piece. Take a shuttle and Delta Team and salvage whatever you can from it."

"Aye sir," Sonja nodded before tapping her badge. "Delta team, assemble at the Shuttles, we're going on a scavenging run!"

* * *

 **Meanwhile - USS _Firestorm_**

 **Sick Bay**

* * *

"So how much longer is this going to take?" Jaden asked, getting slightly annoyed with all of the doctors surrounding him and taking their 'tricorder' readings.

"If the captain were here, I'd have the nanoprobes and have them reprogrammed to do the work for me." Rutia said. "Would you like for me to operate and accidentally cause a problem that would give you a heart attack mid-battle?" Jaden concided the point. The trill put away her tricorder and pulled out a hypospray. "This is an injection of modified nanites. They'll correct some of the problems now, but I'm going to be dragging you back in for PROPER surgery when we're done getting everyone off Reach."

"Fine, fair enough," Jaden shrugged. "Anything to get me back down there - I hate being cooped up in starships."

"You're going to have to be: Captain Drake and the rest of the UNSC higher ups are evacing everyone to those ships. And if I'm right, you might be coming with us." She injected Jaden with the nanites, causing Jaden to feel like he was being tickled. "Sad as it is to say, you're not going to die gloriously down there. What are you, a Klingon with a death wish?"

"I'm just trying to make it count," Jaden informed, standing back up. "I'm not looking for glory, I'm looking to save lives."

"Well, best way to do that is direct the civies to the _St. Elizabeth_ and plant your ass in a chair afterwards." The Trill walked to a console before the ship began shaking. "Oh, great."

" _This is the bridge: all hands, stand to battle stations; repeat, all hands, battle stations._ "

"They don't get the message, do they? We wiped out half their fleet and they want to commit suicide again. This makes NO sense."

"They're a religious empire who've been glassing planet after planet ever since we first made contact back in 2525," Jaden retorted. "Nothing about them makes sense. My old armor still here?"

"Weapons locker five. Though unless they've got transporters, I don't think you're going to need it."

The _Ra Cailum_ and its' attached escort rocked heavily as something fairly heavy impacted the shields before alarms went off.

" _Intruder alert! Repeat, intruder alert, deck 34, section 45 Baker!_ "

"On the other hand, they COULD just brute force their way through with enough kinetic force. Get armored up, I'll join you shortly."

Jaden nodded as he dashed towards the lockers to get his gear back.

* * *

 **Deck 34, Section 45**

* * *

A Covenant Destroyer had rammed into the side of the _Ra Cailum_ , and using the breach they created they proceeded to flood _everyone_ they had in their ship inside the human vessel.

"We take this vessel for the Covenant!" Two brute minors roared in triumph before a phaser beam decapitated one and killed the other with a heart shot as a green human wearing a more revealing version of the usual Ra Cailum uniform, flanked by two MACOs, shook her head.

"I let Sonja go down there and this happens." She sighed "Boys, could you deal with these people until the Lieutenant arrives?"

The two MACO Officers nodded as they opened fire on the Covenant Brutes - which took cover behind the bulkheads, and thus beginning the shooting as the MACO troops took cover to avoid being hit by the Spike Rifle rounds. Another Jiralhanae in heavier armor strolled forward armed with a Brute Shot, and opened fire on them.

"Shit! Cover!" The MACO soldiers shouted as they jumped out of the way, just as the Grenades hit along the walls, causing a bit of damage to the consoles.

"Come on, take them down!" The other MACO soldier retorted, as they returned fire. Catching one of the Brutes in the head, however when he fired at a second one, an odd shield seemed to appear around it just before his phaser hit, deflecting the shot. "Huh? What the?!"

Suddenly several other Jiralhanae troops acquired the same shielding as they advanced forward, however another alien joined in as well. This one looking rather… well, like a floating sack of flesh with tentacles, with armor attached around its form.

"Ensign, that thing's shielding them!"

"Stun it! I don't think it's happy to see these assholes!" The other MACO pulled out a type-2, firing his phaser at it. The low power of the beam shorted out the Covenant equipment, as it wasn't suited to deal with nadion particles. The creature backed away, going into one of the Jefferies tube access ways. "Stop that thing!"

More phaser fire erupted from the other end of the corridor as more MACOs and regular Starfleet Marines fired at the Brutes, who were joined by two big and unwelcome visitors, carrying big guns and big shields.

"What… the… fu-" One of the large blue armored creatures aimed their guns which glowed bright green "COVER!" THe MACO soldiers ducked, but one trooper moved too slow as the Alien unleashed a blast of energy, catching the soldier in the blast and literally reducing him into nothing but ash.

"SON OF A BITCH!" The Orion shouted, as the two hulking figures continued to walk forward - their main guns beginning to fire smaller but more rapid fire plasma down the hall, keeping them pinned down.

"PINKERTON, WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU?!"

More pulse fire came from the rearward corridor as Jaden finally joined the fray. "Fuck me; Hunters!"

One of the pair pointed its' cannon at the Spartan before a blade attached to a long metal staff impaled its' bondmate, pulled back by the chain at the base, tearing into the colony of worms that made up the Hunter.

Jaden found the wielder of that weapon: a blonde in a uniform like Ron's, only with two gold pips instead of four. "This had better be worth getting me away from the helm!"

Jaden blinked, as he processed what he had just witnessed. "…I'm not even gonna ask," he muttered, "But brief description: Hunters, big walking tanks really." The Second Hunter roared out as it charged towards it. "And you just killed its brother, and pissed it off!"

It screeched, but the blonde just groaned. "I've killed worse." It charged at her, swinging its' shield to crush the woman, who grabbed the top, lifting herself upwards. The scythe swung in a downward arc, taking off the gun arm before she jumped off, removing its' head via positioning the blade back, letting motion do the work. The second hunter was dead before it hit the deck. "Voth battle mechs and Herald harbingers were harder to kill. Now who are you and what are you doing on my brother's ship?"

"Lieutenant Jaden-B312, UNSC SPARTAN Program." Jaden informed, "I was brought aboard to… apologize for my earlier… let's say outburst, yeah… now I suppose I'm helping you fight these guys off your ship. And you are, ma'am?"

"Lieutenant Riza Pinkerton, UFP Starfleet. Yes, the captain's my brother. No, he didn't bring me on board because of nepotism. I'm here because I am literally the best pilot in the fleet."

"And very good at killing Hunters, apparently." Jaden muttered, before hearing a purring sound, as he turned and saw the tentacle-like alien poke its head out of the Jeffries Tubes access. The MACO troops rose their weapons at it, but Jaden raised his hand. "Hang on… _that_ is friendly."

"What is it?" Riza asked.

"ONI Calls them Engineers," Jaden informed, "They maintain Covenant equipment, and provide support - and can generate personal shields to anyone around them."

"Is it a threat?"

"No… well, it won't be once you take off that explosive harness on it." He informed, "It's designed to detonate if humans approach… I'd try to take care of that ASAP, Engineers are the only Covenant I have no problems with - they'd never harm a fly from what I've seen."

"Finally." She sighed "A friendly Covenant member." Jaden saw the scythe user pull out another tricorder, and began scanning it. "If we know how it works, we can jam the explosive device and keep it from going off. If we can do that, we can remove the damned harness."

"You can do that?"

"The Dominion once said 'Starfleet engineers are the best in the galaxy; they can make rocks into replicators'." Riza nodded "Give Sonja and her team enough time, they can do anything. Think you can take the MACOs into that thing and rescue as many of these guys as you can?"

"Not a problem," Jaden nodded, prepping his MA37. "Ship's probably filled with them."

Riza nodded as she tapped her combadge "MACO teams alpha, beta and zeta, get onto that ship and kill everything that's actively trying to shoot at you! Rendezvous with Jaden-B312 on Deck 34 for the boarding! I'm going back to the bridge; Mitod, take stock of the situation here."

The Orion saluted her superior before giving her the finger the moment her back was turned.

"…what was _that_ about?" Jaden asked.

"I was KDF before I joined this ship's crew." Mitod shrugged, "Well… it's a long, complicated story, but it pretty much boils down to her trying to kill me when I tried to get into her brother's pants." She sighed "Anyways, let's meet with the MACO teams - we've got a ship to clear."

"Yes Ma'am," Jaden nodded, as he followed the green woman through the halls of the _Ra Cailum_ … unable to resist looking at her-

' _WHERE the FUCK was THAT thought going?_ ' Jaden shook his head, he _never_ felt like that before. Rutia might of done something with that ejection that's messing with his mind. ' _Gonna have to see her after this… mission, mission, focus on the mission damnit!_ '

* * *

" _They RAMMED my ship?_ "

"Yes, onii-sama, they slammed a destroyer into the engineering section. Minor hull damage to decks 32 through 35, sections…" Riza looked at her tricorder to confirm. "38 to 46. Force fields are keeping the bastards from boarding en masse."

" _As soon as the_ St. Elizabeth's _off the ground, we are LEAVING. Get that destroyer out of the hull._ "

"Working on that, it's really stuck in here…" Riza said, "But before we do, we're trying to save some of the crew."

" _Excuse me?_ " Ron asked with a raised eyebrow.

"There's another race within the Covenant's numbers that Jaden referred to as 'Engineers'," Riza informed. "They're non-combattants from what he said, and it seems the Covenant strap suicide harnesses on them to prevent them from being captured. He's leading some MACO teams to board the ship and escort as many of them back here as he can."

"Those in need. Christ. Remodulate the shields and beam Takeshi, Luna and myself back to the ship as soon as you get to the bridge; we're clearly needed."

"I was planning on it."

"And get the MACOs to plant spacial charges inside that destroyer. If we can't pull it out, we'll just crack it; we can deal with the rest when we're safe."

* * *

Jaden knew the MACOs were basically Marines, but these marines had a higher knowledge of technical works then any Marine HE knew.

"Okay, I believe I got this translated," One MACO informed, typing into one of the Destroyer's holographic consoles. "This ship has about… 500 Engineers aboard - correction, 500 _Huragok_."

"How many can we retrieve?" Jaden asked, aiming his rifle at the only other door into the room they secured.

"All of them I think," The MACO replied. "I downloaded a Huragok translation software into my tricorder from here, I think we can communicate with them, and let them know." He tapped his own combadge. "Transporter Room, stand by for beam out coordinates for 500 non-combattants."

"Copy that. We're locking on, but it's going to take a minute; cycling the transporter for 500 targets takes some time, especially with moving targets." A spike impacted the lead MACO's shields, fired by a brute. "Contact! We've got brutes and grunts incoming!" Needles shot past Jaden's head, confirming the presence of Jackal snipers with needle rifles.

Jaden growled as he pulled out his M6G, firing a trio of shots up at the rafters where the Sniper was, scoring a headshot as the Jackal fell to the deck. "Best make it fast!" he shouted, before switching back to his rifle as he unloaded rounds into the incoming aliens.

A Brute chieftain roared as he approached, running with the feared Type-2 melee weapon known as the gravity hammer. "Oh, FUCK!" Phaser fire slammed into the brute, who continued his charge before slamming the hammer into one of the MACOs, crushing him and killing the poor bastard.

"Pathetic humans!" The Brute made a mistake. A massive one.

Normal MACOs were aggressive and skilled. But these were anything BUT normal.

On the Ra Cailum, the standards went up, the weaponry more varied, and the aggression? Through the roof, which was proven as Zeta Actual jumped onto the chieftain and began stabbing it to death with a 5-inch combat knife.

"FUCK YOU, YOU OVERGROWN APE FUCK!" Zeta shouted as he rode the Chieftan's back, who struggled to pull the MACO trooper off of him, before finally the MACO stabbed his spinal cord, and the Brute fell to the ground dead.

" _Transporter control to MACOs: energizing._ " A moment passed before the voice spoke again. " _We've got them. Get back to the ship; captain's ordered us to blow that thing._ "

"We're not sticking around! Grab their shit and run!" It had also be noted that all of the _Ra Cailum's_ personnel were also part-magpie. If it wasn't bolted to the deck, it was in their hands, as they were taking EVERYTHING: plasma pistols, rifles, needlers; you name it, it was being taken. Jaden picked up the Grav Hammer of the Chieftain, before he followed the MACO's out of the ship.

* * *

 **Meanwhile - Surface**

* * *

"ALL ABOARD IF YOU WANT TO LIVE PEOPLE!" Sonja shouted, as Starfleet and UNSC Personnel fell back to the _St. Elizabeth_ in droves - automatic defenses set up by Starfleet batting away the Covenant giving them the time to retreat. They had managed to evacuate a sizable number of people - roughly 50,000 civilians along with two thousand military personnel, including a vast majority of the 19th Shock Troops Battalion.

"FLY, DAMN IT, FLY!"

"We don't exactly have an AI that can get this thing off the ground, Captain!" Ron groaned, marching onto the ship. "I have to do EVERYTHING, don't I?" He extended the assimilation tubules into a computer terminal, accessing engine control. "Ok, get this tub off the ground; I can handle the rest until we get a VI into the network!" The Phoenix-Class colony ship shook as she began moving once more, Ron's brain handling all the most vital functions.

"Ra Cailum, do you have something that can control this thing once we get into space? I can't exactly do this by remote!"

" _I can handle that!_ " A new voice said, as Astarte appeared on the Holo Tank of the bridge " _Give me a minute, I'll transfer over here from_ Saratoga _to get her running!_ "

"Will Drake's ship be alright?"

" _It won't be the first time he's commanded a ship without an AI, sir,_ " Astarte assured. " _Accessing controls!_ "

"As soon as we're in orbit, enter formation with the _Ra Cailum_!"

" _Your warp drive won't help, Captain; the Covenant have point-to-point slipspace capability, and if they track us to Earth—_ "

"Riza, extend our warp field around the fleet, then engage! Takeshi, use the Firestorm's warp drive to boost the field!"

" _You've got it, Boss!_ " Takeshi replied, already settling into his place at the _Firestorm's_ Helm Console.

"Captain, I believe I must inform you the Covenant have superior Slipspace capabilities," Astarte informed, "I do not know if they can follow us through Warp or not, but they have proven time and time again that they can easily perform pinpoint slipspace jumps to wherever, whenever they want. If they follow us through Warp, they can appear right behind us if they follow."

"We're not using conventional warp drive! Let's see these pricks follow us into another _universe_!"

* * *

Jaden stepped off the destroyer before the charges blew and cut the ship's hulk from the _Ra Cailum_ five meters from the breach, the force fields kicking in seconds later, proving just how FAR these people were ahead of the UNSC.

" _UNSC_ Saratoga _, entering formation."_

 _"UNSC_ Jericho _, we're on your portside,_ Ra Cailum _."_

 _"This is the UNSC_ Providence _: we're entering formation_!"

He looked out a window as the three UNSC ships entered the formation, along with the UNSC _St. Elizabeth_. " _UNSC_ St. Elizabeth _, we're in formation! Let's get out of here!_ "

"Standby for warp field expansion."

Jaden cursed. These idiots were going to lead them straight to Earth!

"Hang on tight, Spartan!" The Ra-Cailum shook as the stars began shooting past the hull breach. ' _This is NOT slipspace._ ' Seconds later, the stars were joined by a tunnel of sorts, which was not slipspace, either.

And then, with a flash of bright light, the _Ra Cailum_ \- and its flotilla of UNSC ships - vanished from the sight of the Covenant ships, leaving a bewildered and enraged Jiralhanae commander behind. Clueless as to where they were now…

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: Oddy, Oddy, time to go with the Oddy~**

 **Takeshi Yamato: And with this, the story TRULY begins.**

 **117Jorn: And where does the _Ra Cailum_ and it's Flotilla of starships end up next? Find out next time on the Odyssey!**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**


	6. Chapter 6

**Time/Date: Unknown**

 **Location: Unknown**

* * *

With a burst of light, the _Ra Calium_ came back into existence, along with all of the UNSC Starships around them.

Corpsa staggered to stay on her feet, as the wormhole had caused them all to lose balance. "Report."

"Navigation is working on it, but we're not at Reach anymore."

"And where's the Captain?"

The ship's AI piped in with the answer seconds later. "Still on board the _St. Elizabeth_. He's keeping the UNSC people from rioting."

Takeshi shook his head. "Joy," he said sarcastically. "Well, it's not like we could have left them there."

"Let the boss do his job, while we do ours."

* * *

The sickbay on the _Oddy_ was MUCH better equipped than the one on the _Firestorm_. So much so that Rutia was just working on Jaden's augmentations using the computer. "His life is going to suck in a few hours." The sadistic Trill smirked. "Or Mitod's life. Depends."

Jaden rose an eyebrow. "What are you talking about?" he asked. "Is the process painful? And what does Mitod have to do with it?"

Rutia chuckled a bit. "Oh, you'll see," she said. "Now… Let's take care of that thyroid implant. Just relax."

Jaden sighed, before taking a deep breath. Hopefully this will fix whatever's wrong with him. "I heard you ran into our resident Orion during the boarding action." She said as she prepared her equipment.

"Huh? Oh you mean that Green girl… Mitod?" he asked. "Yeah, she seems… okay I guess, mentioned something about trying to seduce the Captain, and how his sister tried to kill her."

"Yes, that was… a thing." Rutia said, walking back to the table "And did you feel… _strange_ while around her?"

Jaden thought about it for a moment. "Well… looking at her I felt… odd," he admitted. "My head felt a bit… fuzzy maybe? I don't know… I'm just guessing it had something to do with whatever you shot into me before leaving sick bay. Nothing major I don't think… why?"

Rutia paused, as she considered whether or not to tell the SPARTAN that Orions like Mitod put out a pheromone that makes them… more alluring to the opposite sex at will…

…Nah, this might be amusing.

"Nothing, don't worry about it," she said, as she prepared her tricorder. "If there is a problem, I'll take care of it by the time we're done here. Now just sit back, relax, and let me handle this…"

* * *

"Repair work sucks." the _Ra Cailum_ had MANY, MANY NCOs on board, mostly for training purposes. Or mental torture, depending on who asks. In any case, these two fools were in charge of repairing the damage caused by the destroyer ramming into their ship.

"Yeah, but someone has to do it." Another NCO said, picking up another tool. "Don't want Sonja to go after our asses…"

"Yeah, yeah… " the NCO muttered, brushing off some dust from his red shirt. "Heading over to there, hang on…" The crewman went around a corner.

"Its a shame this whole thing happened when it did," The NCO said, "I mean, weren't we like two days from getting retired?" No answer. "Chris? Yo, what's up man?"

When he failed to answer, he rolled his eyes "Damnit Chris, don't tell me you-" he began to say as he went after his friend… only to find a large, hulking figure standing over the lifeless corpse. "Oh Shi-!"

He didn't have time to scream before an energy blade pierced through him seemingly from nowhere, before a Sangheili Zealot materialized from active camo. "Simple humans…" the Covenant alien growled, before tossing the corpse away.

* * *

 **UNSC St. Elizabeth**

* * *

"Major, I don't think you understand what just happened."

"What I understand, Captain, is that we're not on Reach and not heading for Earth! There's a serious problem with that!"

Ron was three seconds from losing his temper. He was not a diplomat. Command knew this; that was why they kept him from any potential first contacts and causing an incident. "Major. We are no longer in your universe. I don't think I can make this any more clear."

"I _understand_ that, so take us back!" Tarkov shouted. "We need to return to UNSC HIGHCOMM and inform them of not just our survival, but that we might have an ally who can kick these Covenant bastards back into the Stone Age!"

"Jumping from one universe to another is not that fucking simple! We arrived in yours by accident, and we have no idea how to get back to ours, let alone yours. We jumped here to save our asses, and yours. But you have my word that my people will be making every effort to make the jumps more… precise."

Ron was not outright lying; it would take dozens of jumps to get a working coordinate system. But these people weren't going to accept that; they didn't have the knowledge. ' _If we jumped into the mirror universe, everything would be easier. …On second thought, fuck that: I want to be NOWHERE NEAR that place._ '

Tarkov took a deep, calming breath, before he sighed "Very well…" he muttered. "I don't like it… but I am trusting you to hold your end of the bargain, Captain Pinkerton. Until then… our mission hasn't changed: we will defend the civilians onboard the _St. Elizabeth_ … until further notice, you can consider the 19th Shock Troops battalion and all UNSC forces here under your command until we return to our homes."

"I'll do my best to get us—" Ron paused as he cocked his head to one side, facing his ship. "Odd. Cassie, what the hell's going on with my ship?"

" _Minor EPS power disruption,_ " Cassie informed. " _I'm working on finding out the cause. I've got people fixing it._ "

"See to it," Ron said, narrowing his eyes slightly as he looked up at the ship. "Hmmm… I've got a bad feeling about this… "

"You sound like me, sir."

* * *

 ** _Ra Cailum_** **Sick Bay**

* * *

"And done," Rutia said, stepping away from the bed. "Your augments are fixed."

Jaden sat up, adjusting his arms and legs. He didn't know how to explain it but… suddenly he felt much, much better. "Huh… well, thanks Ma'am," he said. "I… guess I owe you one."

"So does half the crew." She shrugged "I don't collect. And it's either Rutia or Doc; ma'am makes me sound old. On the other hand, living for almost 16 lifetimes does that."

Jaden stared at Rutia in shock before intelligently going 'buh…?'

"I'm a joined Trill: I've got a slug inside my body." She informed, "I'm Yulanra's sixteenth host, and the 9th female."

"Sixteen?"

"Yup." Rutia chuckled slightly. "Little bastard's one of the older symbionts. Helped me cheat at my courses when I joined; three of those past hosts were doctors."

"…wow…" Jaden muttered, "Your universe has weird stuff… "

"I could say yours does, too—" The doors opened, interrupting the doctor as a small girl entered the sickbay. "Well, well, if it isn't little Larcei. Sorry, dear, but no lollypops today; your exam isn't until next week. And if you get caught with one, your uncle will tan my hide."

"Okay," Larcei said, before noticing Jaden. "Oh, hey, Jaden-san! How are you doing?"

"Oh, fine." Jaden said, smiling slightly seeing the little girl again. "Rutia's done with me, so… just heading to my new quarters, learning where everything, is ya know."

"That's nice…" Larcei said, looking around before she spotted Jaden's armor to the side. "Ohhhhh… what's that?"

"Oh that?" Jaden stood up. "That's my armor, nothing too special I guess."

"Coooool…" Larcei muttered, picking up the Mark V[B] armor that Ron had built to replace the damaged one he had lost on Reach. She then put the helmet on, before looking back at Jaden… who resisted not to laugh seeing the three year old wearing the helmet that was clearly too big for her. "Feels funny…"

"That's… because it's for people much, much older." Jaden said, before taking the helmet off of her.

"Awwww…" she pouted.

"Well, you're free to go Jaden," Rutia said, moving to her desk. "Just… be a bit careful when around Mitod."

Jaden rose an eyebrow "Why?" He asked.

Rutia struggled not to giggle a bit "You'll see," she said, before turning to her Padd.

"Can I come with you, Jaden-san?" Larcei asked.

Jaden glancd down at the girl… and once again found himself at the mercy of just how cute she looked to say no. "Eh, sure - why not?" He said as he slid his helmet back on, and pieced his armor together on him. By the time he was fully clad up, he looked even taller than before.

"Wooow…" she said, sounding a bit amazed. "You look really tall, Jaden-san… "

Jaden chuckled slightly "Yeah, I guess I am." He said, before nodding to Rutia as he headed out of Sickbay - Larcei following him closely behind.

They exited sickbay as the lights dimmed slightly. " _All hands, this is your resident AI: we're suffering minor power fluctuations. Nothing to worry about. We're working on it._ "

Jaden glanced around, his eyes narrowed slightly. Messing with power was something Covenant boarders would often do, cut power to critical systems to make things difficult for the crew. Normally he would assume there _were_ boarders on board… but he assumed Ron would've known, or that the Covenant would've made their presence known sooner.

"Something wrong, Jaden-san?" Larcei asked, looking up at the SPARTAN.

Jaden glanced around one more time, something felt off but he just couldn't place it… but not wanting to worry the little girl, he glanced down - depolarizing his visor so she can see him smile. "Nothing, just a bit of old Paranoia." he said. "Come on, I think my quarters are… this way?"

Larcei giggled slightly "You're not good with directions, are you Jaden-san?" She asked, following him.

"I guess not…"

* * *

 **Meanwhile - Engineering**

* * *

"And… there you go!"

Sonja watched as the Huragok 'Engineer' as the UNSC called them floated free from the explosive harness, letting out a loud series of happy chirps which almost sounded like whale songs.

"She sounds happy," Mitod muttered as the Huragok floated around Engineering.

The huragok grabbed a burned out relay tap, which was in the process of being taken apart for recycling before it picked up its' would be replacement. A moment or so passed before Sonja walked over, only to find two fully functional relay taps. The burnt out one was fixed. "Holy piss. That would've taken days, if not weeks for my people to fix! You did that in two minutes! …I think my captain's going to want to hire you guys for damage control. He tips well."

The Huragok let out another chirping sound. "He says he and the others gladly do this for a living," Cassie's hologram suddenly appeared within Engineering. "And since you and the captain freed them from the Covenant, they will gladly serve this ship and the other ships whenever they are needed… he also mentioned the relay taps should have a new performance rating 15% better than before."

"…You're hired. Let's get to damage control, people; as soon as we're done keeping this ship from falling apart, I want to know more about our new co-workers!" the lights outside main engineering flickered again. "Ok, SOMEONE find out where that leak is! That'll piss off the boss when he gets back from that colony ship."

Three more Hurakog's moved towards the Jeffries tubes faster than Sonja could blink, while more went into the upper floors of engineering. A few minutes later, the lights stopped flickering, and consoles came back to life.

"…I fucking _love_ these guys." Sonja smirked.

"They seem to get to work quick," a voice said, as she looked to the side to see Takeshi and Luna approached. "So, our new guests are settling in nice?"

"Take, these guys have been on this ship for ten minutes, and they've outpreformed some of my best engineers." Sonja informed, "I think this is the start of a beautiful-" However another Engineer flew towards her, chirping madly - sounding much more frightened. "Cassie, what did he say?"

Cassie took a moment, speaking in the engineer's unique language. When it responded, her eyes widened "We have boarders!" she shouted. "He fixed the sensors, there are two Sangheili borders in cloak onboard!"

"Oh shit, bring us to alert!" Sonja informed. "Cassie, can you tell where they are?"

"One moment… " Cassie said, accessing the sensors. "Alright… according to what the Huragok's told me from their cloaking tech, we have two unidentified heat signatures on deck… 10." Her head then snapped up. "Takeshi, Larcei's on that deck right now!"

Takeshi's eyes widened. "Larcei!" he cried out, his hand going back to his blade. "Cassie, can you give me and Luna a point-to-point transport to her location?"

"Transporters are at minimum operating capacity, Commander; I wouldn't be able to beam you anywhere; the sangheili cut open several EPS conduits. You'll have to use the turbolifts to get up there."

Takeshi cursed as he ran to one of the turbolifts, knocking down one of Sonja's engineering crew in the process, Luna just behind him. "Cassie, do what you can to reroute power to the forcefields, and get transporters back at 100%: we need to beam these assholes into space before they do any more damage!"

* * *

Jaden and Larcei had just arrived at his quarters, before Klaxon alarms started sounding again. "What now?" Jaden muttered.

" _Attention all hands: we have boarders onboard!_ " Cassie's voice run throughout the ship " _All MACO teams proceed to Deck Ten!_ "

' _Deck ten… that's us!_ ' Jaden turned his motion tracker on - and not a moment too soon as two faint red blips on the sensors, practically on top of them. "LARCEI, DOWN!" he shouted as he pushed the girl down, as they hit the deck just in time to avoid being sliced in half by a blade of energy. Jaden leaped back up as he spun around and kicked the Elite away - its Active Camo failing to reveal a red armored Zealot, roaring at him with a Type-1 Energy blade at the ready.

Jaden opened the door to his quarters. "Larcei, hide!" he shouted, as he shoved the girl inside before she could protest, and closed the door. He saw a shimmer of light, and whipped out his M6G sidearm and unloaded the full clip into the second elite - not killing it, but knocking out its cloak.

"You want her?" Jaden growled, as he tossed his empty pistol aside, and drew his old knife in his left hand, and Emile's Kukri Knife in his right. "You go through _me_."

The Zealot was the first to charge forward at the challenge, his sword stabbing forward. But Jaden ducked under the strike - as he stabbed into the leg of the Elite, but didn't stab deep enough as it rolled behind him, hurt but not enough to impair his movement. The second Elite tried to attack from behind, its plasma pistol set to overcharge as he knocked Jaden's shields out. It then tried to stab him in his now unshielded back, but Jaden kicked him in the shin, knocking the Elite off balance as he fell to the ground. Jaden wasted no time before he leaped up, and crashed into the Alien's back, and then stabbing his knife into the back of its neck, effectively killing it.

Jaden spun around just in time to catch another strike from the Zealot, holding it back by grabbing its arms. The Elite snarled at him as it fought for dominance over the SPARTAN. "Jeez, you need a tic-tac, split lips." He muttered before he smashed his face into the Elite's, disorientating him a bit and putting him back a few feet. Jaden then charged forward with Emile's knife at the ready, but the Elite recovered faster it punched Jaden in the chest, halting his advance. The Elite then swept his sword downward, and Jaden barely had enough time to grab it - but the Blade itself managed to dig deep into his shoulder plating, Jaden hissing in pain as he could feel the blade hit skin and bone.

"Die… Demon!" The Elite growled out, as it worked harder to push his blade deeper into the SPARTAN, who struggled to hold off the Elite's sword arm, but the wound was making that difficult.

At that point, a bolt of orange energy hit the Elite in the back, knocking down its shields. The Zealot roared as it stood up, turning to face the new threat, only for the blade of a katana to suddenly stick out of its back. "As my friend would say, surprise!" the blade was pulled out before it decapitated the elite, sending the 7-foot alien crashing to the deck plating as a now-cooling corpse.

"You would've finished that had Larcei not been here, would you?"

Takeshi, panting from running almost 200 meters in two minutes, glared at his wife. "…Maybe. Ron is a VERY corruptive influence. You know that," he said, before turning to Jaden. "Where's Larcei?"

Jaden grunted a bit as he relaxed, sliding down the wall. "In there," he nodded to the door to his quarters. "Locked her in when they snuck up on us."

Takeshi sighed a bit in relief. "Thank you," he said. "Just need to make sure the other one's properly dead, then we can either airlock the corpses or bring them to sickbay, depending on both Ron and Rutia's moods."

"I shoved a knife in its spinal cord, I think it's dead," he said, as Luna went to the door, using her security override to open it.

"Kaa-san!"

"Larcei!" Luna shouted as the young girl leaped into her arms. "Are you alright? Did they hurt you?"

Larcei shook her head, even as her eyes glistened with tears. "Uh-uh!" she said. "Jaden-san kept them from hurting me!" Still, she clutched to her mother. "But… I was still scared, Kaa-san…"

"Cassie!"

" _Yes, Commander?_ "

"Run a full sweep of this ship: if you find anymore of these things, beam them into space! Or better yet, in front of Ron! Depends on which one's worse."

" _That's rather extreme, Lunamaria, but hell hath no fury like a mother angered. I'll inform the captain. I'd prepare for the incoming fallout if I were you._ "

"Give 'em to the ODST's - they'd love the target practice," Jaden muttered as he worked back to his feet. "Shh-" he was about to say before remembering Larcei was here "-hhhucks, Rutia's gonna hate I messed her work up already…"

"The fact that we're likely going to give her a couple ex-hostile corpses to autopsy will probably make up for it," Takeshi remarked. At the confused glance from Jaden, he said, "You don't wanna know."

"That aside…" Luna said, turning her attention back to Jaden. "Jaden, right? Thank you… for protecting Larcei."

"Just doing my job ma'am," Jaden nodded. "Anything to keep the kids safe."

* * *

 **UNSC _St. Elizabeth_**

* * *

"Urge to murder. RISING." Tarkov did not want to be near Ron, whose grip on his kilij' hilt was cracking the leather-covered wood. "These assholes boarded MY ship, killed MY people. The only thing keeping me from killing things is the fact that we're not in your universe! And the Prime Directive, but at this moment? FUCK the Prime Directive."

"If it puts you at ease, I can have some of my boys on your ship, clear it of any more covies." Tarkov said, "We just need some thermo goggles - Covenant cloaks usually generate shittons of heat, so you can trace them that way."

"Send over three squads of Marines and Army personnel, plus anyone who wants to volunteer. I'll hand over some of our weapons to make matters easier; your guns are great, and would work WONDERS against the Borg—"

"But yours are better against the split-chins and their lackies, I get it; I saw you kick the shit out of that tank."

"Have them coordinate with my MACO and regular Marines: I want my ship secured."

"Aye Captain," Tarkov saluted "I'll get our best ASAP. Exterminators are on the way."

"Corpsa to Pinkerton: Captain, you had best get back here. We've got navigational sensors back online, and… you're not going to be happy."

"I'm ALREADY pissed. There is no way it could get worse!"

* * *

"I was wrong. There WAS a way for it to get worse." Ron, now standing with his senior staff (sans a VERY gleeful Rutia, who was busy cackling away in sickbay doing her autopsies) looked at the navigational data displayed.

They were in the Sol System, the primary star system of Sector 001, home of Earth.

Almost four centuries in the past in an alternate universe. "DTI is going to have our HEADS. First, we jump into the future, now the past."

"Yeah, they won't be happy…" Corpsa muttered, "Everything shows it's the 21st Century… 2015-ish, all the old countries are here - China, America, England… there are some inconsistencies though…"

"Like?"

"Well, there seems to be a drastic increase of UFO sightings recently," She reported, the screen showing images of the signature saucer-shaped UFO's from the 1950's in the old blurry image format. "Like… a _lot_ more."

"Almost looks like this timeline's dealing with an invasion," Takeshi remarked. "Rina's tapped into the news nets, and there's all sorts of missing persons reports being filed, too - all seemingly in conjunction with these UFO sightings."

Ron shook his head. "Oh please," he said. "While it's true aliens _have_ visited Earth a _long_ time ago, those all happened long _before_ the Roswell Incident. There are no such thing as aliens with giant flying saucers." Tarkov pointed at the _Ra Cailum_. "One _Giant_ Saucer, not a saucer with Nacelles."

Cassie's holographic form, meanwhile, looked out at the screen, humming in thought. "Hang on… " she muttered. "I'm picking up trace amounts of… tachyon particles?"

Takeshi blinked. "Wait, like what you'd get with some cloaking devices?" he asked.

"Yes… but it's not very effective," She informed, "I can get a stable reading, but sensors of this earth may not pick it up… I think we can get a visual - on main screen."

The bridge crew all looked at the screen which zoomed in around the middle east area… and beheld a large saucer-shaped vessel, zipping through the atmosphere.

"Open a channel to that thing." Ron walked to his chair as Cassie opened a channel to the saucer. "Open."

"Unidentified vessel, this is Ronald Pinkerton of the USS Ra Cailum: respond."

Silence greeted them back. "It's like dealing with the Elachi. Too bad for them that my patience has worn all too thin. Lock phasers, disable it."

"Wait…" Cassie rose her hand. "Ron, we've got craft launching from the Earth… you might want to see this."

The image then showed four fighter craft rising up towards the alien contact - with a fifth joining soon after, though the fifth contact was shaped… differently, looking more alien than the other four. The saucer craft fired at the incoming contacts, who broke formation and proceeded to engage. They watched as they dueled with the saucer craft, before the unknown craft fired a blue burst of energy at the Alien vessel, causing a pulse of energy to surround it before the alien vessel began to plummet towards the ground.

"Track that thing. I want to know EXACTLY where it crashes; Takeshi, put a team together in transporter room one; I want you down there. Remember the Prime Directive: keep who you are as secret as possible. Clear?"

"Understood, boss," Takeshi replied. "Come on, Luna."

* * *

 **Meanwhile**

 **Location: Undisclosed**

* * *

" _Contact is down, repeat: contact is down._ "

"Copy that Demon-1, return to base," an officer wearing a green vest informed. "It's our turn now."

"We bagged another one?" The man turned around as a man wearing a lack uniform approached, with the rank pins of a Commander on his collar. He looked to be in his mid to late thirties with short black hair, and greyish eyes.

"Yes Commander," the man nodded. "Shall I send the word?"

The Commander nodded. "Get Alpha Squad prepped for deployment, and get Big Sky in the Skyranger," he said. "We could use more Elyrium, Bradford."

"Done." Central Officer Bradford nodded, as he sent the word out as the base went on alert. "Vigilo, Confido, Commander."

Commander Adrian chuckled slightly, looking up at the flag above them, with the acronym of 'XCOM' displayed for all to see. "Vigilo Confido…"

* * *

Columns of light appeared near the crash site as Takeshi, Luna, and a security team beamed in. "Alright, weapons ready, people," Takeshi told them, drawing his katana. "No telling if the residents of that ship are hostile or not, but better not to take chances."

"Considering their presence here and this Earth's reaction? I think the captain's modus operandi applies, Take."

Takeshi looked at his wife ruefully. "Shoot first, take off their heads and never ask questions?"

"More or less."

Takeshi made the realization that he and Luna spent WAY too much of their time around Ron before he pressed towards the alien ship, recognizing their location: 50 kilometers from the infamous Bekaa Valley in Lebanon. Ron took him and Luna there for shore leave.

They nearly got killed by a 350 year old landmine. They never asked him to join them for shore leave EVER again.

As they advanced, they drew closer to the ship, which seemed to be fairly small for a space-going vessel. It also seemed to have a cross-shaped pattern for everything except the floor, with what looked to be forcefield generation ports set to 'fill the gaps'.

"Not that big…" Takeshi said. "It might just be a scout-"

"Movement!" Luna warned, as she and the other Guards stood at the ready, as they aimed at a small collection of trees. A few moments passed, before an alien which could only be described as a 'Roswell Grey' crawled out of the bushes.

When it turned and spotted Takeshi and the team, it almost immediately dove behind a rock, before poking out from behind its cover and opening fire with some kind of wrist-mounted weapon that spat blasts of green energy, forcing the team to find their own cover.

"They ain't friendly!" One of the guards shouted - taking cover behind a tree. "They are definitely NOT friendly!"

"Weapons free, people; shoot to kill!" Luna pulled out an SRS-99C she pilfered from the UNSC marines, taking aim before firing a single 14.5mm sabot downrange, decapitating the grey in one shot. "How many of them are there?!"

"Tricorder's picking up at least five lifesigns; all non-human!"

Another 'grey' popped up, though this one seemed to have a bit larger cranium, and said cranium was red. It gazed straight at Takeshi, and suddenly Takeshi felt a strange mental pressure in his head, trying to get him to turn his weapon on his comrades. With a growl, he forced the mental presence out of his head, and charged the grey, decapitating it with his sword.

"The FUCK was that?!" one of the guards shouted. "Energy… things started coming out of his fucking head!"

"Telepaths. Now I know why Ron HATES telepaths. If you see them, shoot them on sight!"

Luna took aim with her borrowed rifle, firing at another red-brained alien, blowing its' brains out in one shot. Another alien literally flew out of the ship, looking like a cross between a grunt and a Borg drone with a jetpack. "…Oh, that's just WRONG."

The Floating alien just roared out, before pulling out a green rifle-like weapon, before opening fire on them - soon joined by two more of its kind.

"THIS IS FUCKING INSANE!" One of the Guards shouted, opening fire on the Floating aliens, only for his shots to be dodged by them. "Stay still you buggers!"

However, there was then a loud 'thump' noise, and the others all looked as a walker-like mech stepped out of the ruined saucer, and began firing at them.

"Perfect. Just freaking perfect."

* * *

"Command, this is Big Sky: we're at the drop point. Be advised, we're seeing weapons fire at the crash site. Someone's having a shooting contest with the x-rays, and I don't think they're losing."

There was a short pause " _Big Sky, this is command: proceed with caution, alerting Alpha Squad now,_ " the Commander informed. " _Be advised: Geoscape is picking up another UFO heading to your location, looks like the aliens called in backup this time._ "

"Understood, Command," Big Sky replied. "Setting her down."

* * *

In the back of the Skyranger, six men and women were suited up with various weapons in hand, as they awaited for their chance to drop.

" _Colonel Kelley?_ " One figure, a man with a balding head covered by a dark green military cap, glanced up, adjusting his Titan armor. " _You may be getting some company._ "

"Sir?"

" _Another alien ship is on approach, and there appears to already be people on the ground fighting the x-rays._ " The Commander informed, " _They seem to have some success fighting them… but deploy with caution._ "

"Copy, Commander."

"So, who wants to take bets on who these new guys are?" Another man said - armed with a SCAR-H assault rifle. "Rogue XCOM unit that's been nice and hidden until now? Some other group?"

"No clue, but we're about to find out, Potter. Standby for deployment." The Skyranger hit the ground, with the rear hatch opening and the team filing out as quickly and orderly as possible.

As the team filed out, they spotted evidence of the fight, and while the green plasma blasts of the alien weapons were expected… as were the bullets being fired by one member of the opposing side… the sight of orange energy bolts and beams was NOT expected.

"Command… the hostiles are getting their asses handed to them."

"Colonel, I'm going to need something better than that."

"We've got a woman firing a 50 cal at the aliens, and everyone else is using energy weapons." One of the humans took a hit from the shot, but he wasn't harmed, the blast impacting some kind of shield.

"Oh, that's just not FAIR."

"War's never fair," A hulking figure clad in a massive suit of armor informed. "But they're killing X-Rays, so their friends of ours! Colonel?"

Colonel Kelley nodded, preparing his rifle "Alpha squad, engage!" He shouted.

* * *

One of the floating xenos took a 14.5mm round to the head thanks to the marksmanship skills of Lunamaria Yamato, crashing to the ground in a heap of flesh and metal. "This is getting ridiculous. Takeshi, how mad would Ron be if I called down an orbital bombardment?!"

"Probably very!" Takeshi replied, as he used his Type-2 Phaser to blast another flying one. "It's not exactly subtle!"

"I am not caring about subtle right now! I'm down to three clips—" She took a reactionary shot at another floater, removing its head and sending it flying into a gray, killing both. "And this magazine just ran out of ammo!"

More gunfire was heard as one of the unknowns was killed, joined by another floater. "Ra Cailum, did you beam down reinforcements?"

" _Negative, Commander. Why?_ "

"Because someone else has started shooting at these guys!" Takeshi replied. "I think the locals might have just shown up, and with circumstances as they are, I don't think the Prime Directive is gonna work that well!"

They then heard a loud shouting, as they looked back as a large hulking figure clad in armor came charging from the forest. The alien robot turned to face the new threat, before the human's arm activated rockets on its fist before it punched the mech - sending it flying into the side of the crashed ship.

Soon after, coming from the same direction, five additional contacts came out, firing with a mixture of old 21st century firearms, and a few… lasers?

"Well, at least the Federation Science Council'll be pleased about this when we get home. MACOs, let's give these guys a hand!"

The Aliens knew these people, and as both teams were shooting at them, they made the wise choice.

They ran. They ran SO far away, fleeing towards the other end of the valley.

It would not save them.

"Maximum range of these things is what, 20 kilometers, Commander?" Luna sighed before taking one of the MACOs' rifles, setting it for extreme range shots. While the SRS-99 was a nice gun, its' range was limited to eight kilometers at best. She pulled the trigger, and easily scored a headshot on the running alien, followed by two more shots.

"Nice shot." The Starfleet personnel all turned their attention towards the new contacts - who had their weapons out, but not aimed. "Whoa whoa, hang on… no need to get hostile here."

"Who are you?" Takeshi asked.

"Colonel Nicholas Kelly, Extraterrestrial Combat Unit, or XCOM for short," the man informed. "You?"

Deciding that the Prime Directive was basically defunct in this instance, Takeshi decided to be honest. "Commander Takeshi Yamato, United Federation of Planets Starfleet," he said.

"…The fuck?"

"Trust me, it's complicated. If you want more, you'll have to contact my commanding officer. Although he hasn't had much sleep, so he's going to be...understandably mad." Takeshi took off his combadge, debating on giving it to him to contact the Ra Cailum.

' _Screw it._ ' He handed Kelly the badge. They couldn't do anything with it, anyways, and even if they DID, Cassie and Ron would RUIN them.

"Corpses are tagged for transport; easy to lock onto phaser signatures. We're ready to leave, Takeshi."

"Understood," Takeshi replied. He tapped Luna's combadge. " _Ra Cailum_ , beam us up, but lock onto my biosigns rather than my combadge."

The Starfleet Away Team disappeared in swirling columns of light, the corpses soon following.

"…did… did they just-"

"Yes, I know… I saw it," he replied with a sigh. "Radio Command, let them know to prepare salvaging ops on the ship. Prepare to RTB. "

* * *

 **USS _Ra Cailum_**

* * *

"Just ONE day without a major crisis would be nice." Ron stumbled into his quarters, wanting to rest his mind through at least four hours of sleep. The problem was, life had other ideas as the chime to his door rang. "FUCK! Yes, NOW what?!" The door opened, allowing a Vulcan woman wearing a science-variant of the Odyssey uniform (which singled her out as a new arrival: everyone either wore the classic Dominion War-era uniforms or Takeshi had them wearing combat-modified Oddy unis) to enter his quarters.

"Excuse me, but who the hell are you?"

"I… am T'Sani?" The Vulcan woman said… sounding a bit emotional for a normal Vulcan. "I was assigned to the _Ra Cailum_ as your ship's Counselor."

Ron blinked "Since when?"

"Since we launched from Earth Space Dock," She informed, "I… would've introduced myself earlier, but with all that's been going on I assumed you didn't want anything _more_ to worry about."

"You'd be right." Ron said, sitting back up "I thought I told Admiral Quinn we didn't need a ship's counselor. The last one we had ran off screaming."

"Yes, sir, but Admirals Janeway, Riker, and Jellico assigned me to this ship after several months of searching," T'Sani explained, shrugging. "They believe me… immune to your insanity."

Ron smirked. "A Vulcan with a sense of humor," he chuckled. "This will be fun. I'll give you a week."

T'sani raised the iconic brow. "Sir?"

"I'm giving you a week before you turn out to be as crazy as the REST of my crew."

"Meh, that's assuming I'm not already a bit crazy," She said smirking "I'm already probably the only Vulcan in the federation who has openly said 'fuck logic'… really, I said that right in front of the headmasters of the science academy when I left."

"Oh, we're going to get along SWIMMINGLY." Ron chuckled "I'll send you over to the _St. Elizabeth_ ; plenty of people over there who need working on."

T'Sani rose an eyebrow "With respect, captain, I thought Commander Yulanra was the mad scientist."

"Mad DOCTOR." He corrected, "Half the time, I'M the mad scientist. The rest of the time, that goes to the science division."

T'Sani shrugged "Fair enough," she said. "I'll head over there then - help out where I can. Also going to have to get that psych eval on that Supersoldier onboard eventually, but that can wait."

"I can ask him to speak with you. I won't exactly give him much choice in the matter, either."

"As sadistic as I've heard, sir, but I'd rather deal with him without you making matters worse."

Ron sighed. "Alright, then, Commander." He said, "Welcome aboard and I expect to see your efforts bear fruit."

"With this crew, sir, I doubt it."

Ron waved her off. "Go. I need to sleep. It's been a busy three days, and I'd like to sleep."

"Should I play Go the Fuck to Sleep, audio by Samuel L. Jackson?" T'Sani asked, grinning slightly.

"…Get the hell out of my room and let me sleep, Commander; I'll be less crabby in the morning."

"Aye aye, pleasant dreams, sir." T'Sani smirked, before stepping out.

"Pleasant dreams. I get nothing but nightmares." Ron's head hit the pillow, and the captain attempted to sleep for at least four hours.

" _Captain to the bridge_."

"FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU—"

* * *

Takeshi stood in front of Ron in the Captain's Ready Room, delivering his report.

"In the end, with the situation as it was, I considered the Prime Directive to be pretty much defunct at that point," he said, finishing up.

"I am going to be mad when I get up tomorrow morning. Rutia's probably having fun with the bodies you recovered, you finally got a taste of my hate for telepathy—"

"Yeah, starting to get why you have such tight rules for telepaths on board, now."

"And I haven't slept in 96 hours. Understandably, I'm not pleased."

"Understandably," Takeshi replied. "You want me to deal with these XCOM people if and when they call, give you a chance for some rest?"

"As much as I would LOVE to...no. You know regulations, Take: captain's gotta deal with negotiations. It's the way of things." The door to the ready room opened, and in came their resident Dr. Frankenstein. "Hoi-oh, Ru-ru."

"Don't call me that, _Ronnie_. I just finished my prelims on the corpses. They make the Singh experiments look like child's play."

"Genetic manipulation?" Takeshi guessed.

"Yes… unlike anything I've ever seen," Rutia said, shaking her head. "Those floating ones were modified to a point I can barely tell where the machine ends and the organic material begins. The Roswell Greys seem to have signs of mass cloning and mental alterations which give them a strong telepathic ability - especially to the one with the glowing head. Whoever… or _whatever_ did this is a master of genetic and mechanical augmentations that rivals, if not surpasses anything we've encountered before."

"The Iconians."

"Please don't remind me of the Heralds."

"Undine."

"Them too. And don't mention the Borg."

Ron took the PADD out of her hands and came up with one conclusion after a brief glance. "Infiltrators and soldiers. This is war. And you know what we do when war comes. Inform the St. Elizabeth and her escorts to set a course to Mars and put down on the surface. Takeshi, get in contact with the XCOM commander in chief. Rutia, continue your autopsies. I want to know how to kill these assholes with the flick of a switch."

"Got it, Ron," Takeshi replied.

He waved his hand dismissively, a cue both of his officers knew as 'do what you do best' and took their turns to leave.

"These bastards want a war? I'll give them a war _they can't win_."

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: That's right, folks! XCOM: Enemy Unknown/Enemy Within!**

 **Ron the True Fan: Limited experience here, so I'll leave everything in the hands of my more than capable co-authors. Though when we get to (Censored for spoilers) …DAMN IT JORN! I thought I told you to turn that thing off!**

 **117Jorn: *holding censor button* Hey! No Spoilers for the readers! We've got a lot to do, and we can't let them in on what the future holds!**

 **Ron the True Fan: Well to quote Kosh, so it begins.**

 **Ja Ne!**


	7. Chapter 7

**Time/Date: 2015 AD**

 **Location: Sol System, Earth**

* * *

"You are certain about your findings?"

Colonel Kelley sighed "Yes, I've shown you the recording over a thousand times by now," he said. "They're human, they have advance technology, and they are _not_ friends with the x-rays."

"The lady had a beam rifle that hit a Sectoid at 20 klicks." Adrian resisted smiling. The longest range sniper round that had a confirmed kill was at 2475 meters by a L115A3 fired by British sniper Corporal of Horse Craig Harrison. That was the same reason that XCOM used the weapon as their go-to sniper rifle.

That thing beat it by a factor of _eight_. They needed these people on their side.

"And you're sure they said 'United Federation of Planets Starfleet'?" asked a balding man with glasses.

"Yeah," the Colonel replied. "You recognize it, Dr. Shen?"

"I'd imagine that just about anyone would recognize it, if they thought about it," Dr. Raymond Shen, Chief Engineer of XCOM, replied. "The bigger question is, what are members of an organization in a prominent _science fiction franchise_ doing here?"

"…excuse me?" Bradford asked, before Adrian facepalmed.

"Oh my god…" he muttered. "Star Trek… motherfucking _Star Trek_?"

"I… suppose it's not _impossible_ …" Dr. Vahlen said, shrugging, "We know the aliens are capable of traveling through dimensions… this leads to the possibility of Stephen Hawking's multiverse theory being ever more plausible… as difficult as it may be to swallow. In this case… what is our science fiction, is their… science fact."

Bradford let out a tired sigh. "Alright, so… what do we do?" he asked.

"Our first order of business is figuring out if they know what _we_ know about Star Trek, and the X-Ray's," Adrian informed. "I remember Star Trek, used to watch the show religiously when I was a kid - Starfleet could be our biggest ally, though that Prime Directive of theirs might prevent them from giving us any of their technology…" He blinked as he got several odd stares from the senior officers. "What? I can't be a Trekkie _and_ Commander of XCOM?"

"Just… surprised, is all," Bradford replied.

"Well… either way, we have the Council's approval," The Commander informed. "We wait for them to contact us, until then we continue to prepare and proceed with standard operations. No matter what we do not under any circumstances piss them off - this could be the break XCOM has been looking for… as unlikely as it may be."

"I wonder how people will take the news when we finally get declassified?" Shen mused. "A Covert anti-alien task force fighting alongside a coalition of star systems from a science fiction series…"

"It'll be interesting to read, doctor."

* * *

 **USS Ra-Cailum**

* * *

While Takeshi prefered the fancier looking Oddy dress uniforms, Ron did not like them at all. They were too formal, not enough functional.

Hence Ron wearing the classic red jacket of the 2280s with a white turtleneck. The classic, long-lasting uniform was perfectly suited for going into combat while looking formal enough to go to a ball. And as he was going down there, he wanted to look nice. The door to his quarters chimed before Ron glanced back at it. "Come in."

Stepping into the room was none other than SPARTAN-B312 himself, still clad in his MJOLNIR V[B] Armor - now repaired once again after the last… engagement with the Elites. "You wanted to see me, sir?" Jaden asked.

"Yes, Lieutenant," Ron nodded. "I was thinking of having a united front when we visit XCOM GHQ. I thought of bringing you along to represent the UNSC. Interested?"

Jaden rose an eyebrow, "I'm not a negotiator, Captain."

"Neither am I," Ron shrugged. "I am, in truth, an engineer. I build things. I fix things. I just so happen to know how to blow things up and learn how scientific things work. Yet I'm going down there. There comes a time where we have to do something we're not meant to do. This is one of those times."

"Wouldn't it make more sense to have Captain Drake be the one representing the UNSC?" Jaden asked. "Or someone more qualified than a SPARTAN Supersoldier?"

"Yes, but there's no one better suited to show that we're not going to sit in orbit and watch," he reasoned. "Besides, Captain Drake is busy keeping his people from rioting after we sent them to Mars. We're dealing with soldiers. You'll provide a more… military viewpoint. And in case of hostilities, protection for Takeshi and his wife."

"Not you?"

"I can take care of myself. I'll have Takeshi show you to the shuttlebay."

Jaden closed his eyes, before he groaned. He wasn't exactly in a position to say no. "Fine, fine…" he muttered. "Let's just get this over with…"

"Thank you."

* * *

A Class-1 shuttle was picked for the flight. Ron liked the _Ra-Horakhty_ , and as such it was labelled 'the Captain's Shuttle', used more often than the _Isis_ , his yacht, which had been given, more or less, to Rutia, who turned it into a second and mobile sickbay. On the other hand, like every other shuttle on board, the damn thing was more a frigate the size of a shuttle thanks to Sonja's unconventional skills.

Takeshi was one of the first onto the shuttle, and quickly moved to take the pilot's seat - no way was he risking the chance of 'Riza, destroyer of shuttles' taking the controls.

"Ok, you're taking this seriously."

"Luna, this is Ron's favorite shuttlecraft. The same shuttlecraft that he LITERALLY killed fifty Tal shiar operatives to get back. I'm not letting Riza accidentally wreck it on a simple flight down there."

Luna smirked as she sat in the co-pilot's seat. "Like how?"

"Remember the time she pulled a Kulbit, a Cobra, and half a dozen OTHER ACM maneuvers all at the same time?"

Luna paled, remembering what happened to the last shuttlecraft Torrens.

"There's a reason she's called the 'destroyer of shuttles', Luna," Takeshi continued. "She's great with the big ships, but should NEVER touch anything smaller than a _Dakota_ -class."

"Sonja's working on it."

"NEVER."

The rear hatch opened, and in came their commanding officer, wearing what they thought was a ridiculous dress uniform: the ever-enduring 2280s uniform, complete with pips and squeaks that added up to 22 years serving in Starfleet on the left cuff. "I take it you literally ran down here to avoid Riza getting word that we're flying down?"

"Yes," Takeshi replied. "I am **_not_** letting Riza wreck this thing, or **_any_** of our shuttles, ever again!"

"Wise choice." Ron stepped into the shuttle, followed by none other than Jaden, fully decked out in his powered armor suit.

"Why's he here?"

"Representing the UNSC half of our little fleet and serving as your protection."

Takeshi raised an eyebrow. "Not yours?"

"Take, I can handle a shot from a Vaadwaur tank, you can't."

"…Fair enough," Takeshi replied. "So, anyone else coming along?"

"Me." In walked their resident mad doctor Trill, still wearing the now very popular medical attire used by Beverly Crusher during her time on the Enterprise-D. "He figured that having the doctor would help. Plus I never get to leave the ship."

All three senior officers shared a glance. "For good reason."

"Well, best get this over with." Jaden said, heading for the back. "Someone should probably give them the call to expect us."

"Already being done. Benefits of having a subspace comm array in your head."

* * *

 **XCOM GHQ**

* * *

"I've tied the communicator into our communications systems." Shen informed, "So we should be able to—"

" _SURPRISE, MOTHERFUCKERS!_ "

The loud, crude greeting took everyone aback before the voice began laughing. " _That never gets old. This is Captain Ronald Pinkerton of the_ Ra Cailum; _anyone hearin' me?_ "

' _…definitely_ not _like Captain Kirk or Picard…_ ' Adrian thought, before he sighed "This is Commander Adrian Sheridan, commanding officer of the Extraterrestrial Combat United, or XCOM for short," he spoke. "A pleasure to hear from you, Captain."

" _And a response! Lovely. We'll be on your doorstep in about half an hour; mistake hooking the combadge into your comms; I know EXACTLY where you are, so… get a plane in the air for escort duties. Formalities are a bit of a bitch._ "

"…Right. How—"

" _I've got a subspace transceiver in my head; it comes in handy. Pinkerton out!_ "

The comms turned off, and Adrian sighed. "Sounds like that Captain had an encounter with the Borg," He said.

"The… Borg?"

"Remember Doctor Who's Cybermen? Think them, only a lot more scary."

Dr. Vahlen shook her head. "Out commander is a sci fi nut," she muttered. "How are we still alive again?"

"Its _because_ I'm a Sci Fi nut we've probably lasted this long." Adrian smirked slightly, "Get the briefing room ready - we've got guests to greet."

* * *

The Ra-horakhty flew in circles for five minutes until a pair of XCOM interceptors met up with the shuttle, finally giving Takeshi something to do. "You know EXACTLY where their base is?"

"Homing signal from the combadge. A little degraded, but I know its' location; underground, 300 kilometers from here."

"Borg Tech comes in handy," Takeshi replied. "Only way we can use it is freeing assimilated drones from the collective, though."

"From what I've read up on those freaks I'd rather not," Jaden shook his head. "It looks like any attempt to reverse-engineer their tech for even you guys backfires horribly."

"Unless it's me, but even then, I have to program them EXACTLY before I inject." The shuttle and the two fighters flew towards the XCOM base, the fighters breaking off to land elsewhere while the shuttle could VTL its' way down. The shuttle flew over a large mountain - the top of which proceeded to slide open, revealing a completely hollowed interior. The shuttle easily capable of fitting as it settled through the hole.

"Secret mountain hideaway. How very Bond of them." Luna began humming the aforementioned theme before the shuttle entered the hangar bay.

"Locator systems have partial link to local GPS," Takeshi informed. "Apparently we're in Colorado - either they repurposed NORAD or they carved out another mountain."

"I REALLY don't care where we are." Takeshi put the craft down, and they all got up, Ron slamming his hand on the rear hatch control, as the doors slid open, allowing the team the chance to exit. They were quickly greeted by none other than the XCOM Squad that Takeshi and Luna had met during their mission ear

"Captain Pinkerton?" the Colonel spoke. "Colonel Kelley, CO of Alpha Squad - welcome to XCOM HQ."

"Pleasure," Ron nodded. "Well, you mind showing us to where your Commander awaits us?"

"Yes sir," the Colonel nodded, as the rest of the people of the shuttle stepped out "Just follow us and-"

"…Master Chief?" A voice whispered, coming from a young man wielding a SCAR-H Assault Rifle, looking at Jaden.

Jaden blinked, looking at the man in question "Excuse me?" He asked.

The XCOM soldier blinked, before shaking his head "Oh, no - it's n-nothing." He said, but _did_ send a worried glance at Kelley, who nodded.

"Please, follow me." The Colonel said, as they turned towards the hangar doors with the representatives following - though Jaden kept his eye on the Soldier, who had 'Christopher Young' on his badge. Why did he call him Master Chief?

* * *

Sheridan was mildly concerned when he saw the shuttle come in on the holo screens. It was the Galileo-type shuttle from The Final Frontier, which, while one of the weaker movies, had the plus of being the only TMP-era one to have an actual shuttle. The captain's use of the Wrath of Khan uniform didn't make things any easier: for all he knew, the _Ra Cailum_ was a _Miranda_.

And those things SUCKED.

Though what followed the Captain out of the shuttle brought things into a little more perspective. A man and a woman, wearing uniforms that came straight out of the MMORPG Star Trek Online (Which he'd dabbled in a few times while on break) - specifically, the new 'Odyssey Dress' Uniform. And then came a woman wearing the Beverly Crusher Medical Jacket from TNG.

That caused him a little relief, but only a little - it meant that they were from the 2409-2411 range, but they could still be in just about anything, including the wimpy _Miranda_ and the even **_wimpier_** _Oberth_. On the other hand, they could have a _Sovereign_ , or a _Defiant_ , or maybe even an _Odyssey_.

Part of him _was_ semi-hoping they brought a _Constitution_ -class.

By god he loved the Connie.

However, while he easily identified them, there was another figure with them that almost made him have a heart attack. A fully armored individual. He knew exactly what kind of armor that was: MJOLNIR Mark V[B] Armor, worn by SPARTAN-III's from the Halo Universe… most famously used by Noble Six.

And judging from the Kukri Knife, it was very possible that it _was_ Six.

' _It's like the beginning to a Crossover Fanfic,_ ' the Commander thought with a groan. ' _Okay… just break the news to them gently, we_ need _them on our side._ '

The guests all entered the operations room, the captain glancing around. "Nice setup. I'd add a bit of carpeting to make it more homey, myself." He shrugged before stepping forward "Captain Ronald Pinkerton, CO, USS _Ra Cailum_. My apologies for dropping in on you in Lebanon, but I wanted more information on what the hell was going on."

"Not a problem - I should be thanking you, Captain." Adrian said, standing up. "Any help fighting the Aliens is appreciated. Commander Adrian Sheridan, XCOM… can't say I have a ship of my own, unfortunately. I _suggested_ a mobile base, but the Council says otherwise."

"And the Federation Council protested giving command of an _Odyssey_ -Class starship to someone like me, but that didn't stop Admiral Quinn." Ron shrugged. "If you're wondering about the different uniforms, Takeshi over there has his own little ship: his crew all wear combat-ready uniforms while the rest of my crew wears older, more functional models. And our guest here isn't even from our universe. So I can say I've had a fun day. …And why are you sweating nervously?"

Adrian was indeed sweating nervously, before he took in a deep breath. "Well… there isn't exactly an easy way to say this…" he said. "First off… you haven't happened to see any of our… media, have you?"

"Not really; only been here for 15 hours." He informed. "Why?"

Adrian sighed, turning to the screen. "You… _might_ want to watch this," he said. "Play file: TOS, Opening."

As the computer played the file, Takeshi, Luna, and Ron watched. At first it was just a picture of moving stars, with music playing in the background. Ron was about to ask what he was watching, before a voice spoke out.

" _Space, the Final Frontier._ "

"Kirk?" Ron asked, before the image of a _Constitution_ -class Cruiser sped past the screen "The hell?!"

" _These are the voyages of the Starship_ Enterprise," The voice which sounded disturbingly like that of James T. Kirk spoke, as the _Connie_ \- which was now clearly identified as the original NCC-1701 - flew past a planet. " _Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life, and new civilization. To Boldly go where no man has gone before!_ "

The screen once again shifted to the stars, before the _Enterprise_ sped past again, and the words "STAR TREK" appeared on the screen, before the music kicked up, as credits began to roll with 'William Shatner' playing James T. Kirk.

Once it had ended, Takeshi had only one thing to say. "Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot, over?"

"Haven't I told you to curse properly if you're going to curse at all, Take?" Ron said, groaning as he facepalmed. "This changes nothing: one man's reality is always another's fiction. So they have some knowledge of our universe. Big deal."

"…not… some…" Adrian informd, causing them to blink. "This… is the opening to the _original_ series… back in 1966, and ran for three seasons, before there were the 1979 movie, followed by the 1982's Wrath of…" he sighed. "Excuse me, but I must do it this way… the Wrath of KHAAAAAAAAAAAN!" The others winced slightly at the sudden scream. "Sorry, I can't help myself… but, yes then the 1984 movie… followed by three more movies in the TOS time period, before switching into the Next Generation period covering the exploits of the USS _Enterprise_ -D, which ran for seven seasons, and having its own movies such as Star Trek Generations, First Contact, Insurrection, and Nemesis. As well as the spin off series such as Star Trek: Enterprise which covers the NX-01 _Enterprise_ , and ST: Deep Space Nine which covers… take a guess. And then there's the video games, the books, graphic novels, comics, fan-made films…and most recently the reimagined movies by J.J Abrams."

Ron took another sigh "Okay… you know a _lot_ more about our universe," he said, "But still, it doesn't change anything… especially those reimagined series. What could be important-"

"Ambassador Spock is still alive."

"…What."

"Ambassador Spock is still alive," Adrian repeated. "In your universe - I am assuming it's, say… 2409-11 ish? Hobus went supernova and he went missing after using Red Matter to stop it from causing massive damage across the galaxy? You believe him to be dead? He's not. He, and the Romulan Nero were sent into the past via a Black Hole. And by doing so, they created an alternate universe. One where Captain Kirk's father died aboard the USS _Kelvin_ when it engaged the _Narada_ commanded by Nero, leaving Kirk fatherless. And Spock - who appeared later on in the timeline of said alternate universe, was captured by Nero who claimed the _Jellyfish's_ Red Matter, and used it to destroy Vulcan in front of Spock… but, he _is_ still alive in that timeline, in that universe."

"Command is going to have a fit." Ron groaned out.

"Yes, they will." Adrian nodded. "Still, Captain, we should sit down and…" He pointed to Jaden. "Your friend—"

"He's a supersoldier. We recently got shot into another universe and rescued everyone we could, including him, from another planet under attack."

"Against an alien alliance called the Covenant bent on Humanity's total extinction?" Adrian finished, causing them all to blink - Jaden doing a double take.

"Wait, what?!" he shouted.

"And that planet, wouldn't happen to be called Reach, now would it?" Adrian asked, before sighing. "Play file two… Halo: Reach."

Jaden looked at the screen intently, before it switched to a first person perspective of someone holding a helmet… _his_ Mark V[B] helmet, before spinning it around and placing it on his head. The camera then switched to a third person perspective, showing none other than Jaden himself in the passenger seat of a transport Warthog, two Falcon helicopters flying overhead. "The hell…?"

The screen skips over to the Warthog coming to a stop, as the choppers landed. On the screen Noble Six stood out of the Hog, before walking towards the small camp set up, passing by one of the Falcon's. Inside the camera showed a Spartan in Scout armor, loading up the ammo clips to an SRS-99AM Sniper Rifle, watching as Six walked past him. "…Jun?"

Then, the screen switched to Six entering the camp itself, confronted by a man wearing heavy armor, and a dome-like helmet which had a skull-like marking carved into the visor, and sharpening a Kukri knife with his armor… the same knife Jaden had. "Emile…"

However then, a mechanical arm stuck out in front of Six, belonging to another Spartan, this one with a helmet off. "Kat…" The woman glanced away, speaking to someone off screen, as the camera then switched over to two more Spartans, one in blue armor, and another hulking figure in orange/green armor. "Jorge… Carter…"

"I didn't think anyone survived Pesagi, sir." The large one said.

"SPARTAN's never die, Jorge," Carter said, picking up his own helmet. "We're just missing in action."

The scene then switched to Noble Six following the other Spartans out of the camp. "I read your file, Lieutenant," Carter said. "Including the parts ONI didn't want me to." They climbed into Jun's Falcon. "I'm glad to have your skill set, but you can leave that Lone Wolf stuff behind. "

"This our new Number Six?" Jun asked.

"Affirmative," Jaden nodded on the screen.

"You picked a hell of a day to join us," Jun said, as the camera panned out as the Falcon's took off - heading off towards the distance where a battlefield was somewhere behind a mountain, someone on the radio claiming how Noble Team was heading out, just as a massive explosion in the distance could be seen. The Screen then came to the tile: "Halo: Reach", but before the video was over, there was a brief scene of a Covenant Elite igniting its energy sword, before snarling at the camera.

When the video ended, Jaden was silent, processing what he had just seen.

"Well, that just reinforces what I just said."

"You seem calm about this, Captain. We just told you that here, you're _fictional_."

"Commander, in the end, we're _all_ fictional. Best to accept it and move on. Besides, if you have half the crap we've seen and dealt with, you'll know alternate universes are nothing new. Now, I believe we both have things to share, and while the phrase is anachronistic in our century, time is money, and we're wasting it."

"That we do," Adrian nodded. "Just wanted to go ahead and get _that_ out of the way… but on to business. Now, I'm not going to pretend I don't know what the Prime Directive is - I know that you probably consider helping us will violate that… but seriously, we _really_ need help here."

"What's with the aliens?" Takeshi asked. "What do they want?"

"We have no idea," Adrian shook his head. "They attacked earlier this year without warning in Germany, took out nearly a whole squad of my people. Since then they've been abducting civilians, terrorizing entire cities, and shooting down satellites. We recently got a victory when we destroyed what we believe to be their command center on earth… but Alien attacks haven't slowed since. Any attempt to make any form of contact with them fails miserably… and not to mention how EXALT has been a _massive_ thorn in our side as well."

"They've _shot_ at _my people_." Ron said, smirking a bit. "At the woman who is _basically my sister and_ her husband. **_FUCK_** the Prime Directive; we're getting _COMPLETELY_ involved and kicking some serious ass!"

Adrian smiled. This was no Picard, Kirk, or even Sisko, the latter of whom was the most… nasty of the three. He was worse. He wasn't going to take it; he was going to give it back by shoving it up their asses!

The Commander was going to _love_ this man.

"You have no idea how much of a relief that is to me, Captain," he informed. "Now… I'm not going to be asking for your most advanced technology - I know you'd never give us that. But what I would like to ask from you is some of your… _older_ tech."

"Like?"

"22nd Century grade technology," he elaborated. "Equipment and tech from that era will be more than enough to help us even the odds against the aliens. "

Ron thought about it for a second. Historically, handing over older weapons and technology always worked: the Soviet Union handed over downgraded but still potent weapons and equipment during the Cold War.

"Alright, seeing as the Prime Directive doesn't apply. But know this: abuse it, I will find out. And when I find out, I will rip out your skull and beat you to death with it." The Commander nearly opened his mouth before Ron added, "I never said it had to be your _entire_ skull, did I?"

Takeshi put a hand on Ron's shoulder. "And this is why you should've left the talking to me, Ron. Sorry, Commander, it's been a trying week, and Ron is not exactly… comfortable with breaking the Prime Directive. He's a little more flexible on other regs, but the Prime Directive's more or less the only rule he won't touch."

"I understand fully," Adrian nodded. "I know what has happened to races whom the directive was broken for. That one planet that developed a prohibition-era gang culture, the Nazi planet, the one where Kirk finds a society divided by Commies and Yanks, the last thing I want is to cause anything remotely similar to those. I just want mankind to survive without compromising what makes us human."

"…I want full access to those shows and movies. DTI and Multiversal Studies are going to LOVE having access to them."

"Trying to avoid getting into trouble?"

"Damn right; if those two are happy, EVERYONE is happy."

Jaden was still silent, his mind racing with the information he had been given. It was absurd, unbelievable… yet there it was, he just saw the animated faces of all of Noble Team, with their voices and everything.

But then… a thought occurred to him. But before he could act on it, suddenly there was a sound of an explosion, followed by the whole base shaking.

"The hell?" Adrian asked, accessing the communications. "Bradford! What's going on here?"

" _We've got a breach!_ " Bradford shouted, as alarms started going off. " _I don't know what the hell happened, but our own people are acting as if they've been mind controlled and sabotaging critical areas! We've got pings on long-range sensors and the main gate's opening up!_ "

"I think our friends found your base," Ron said, as the base shook again. "And I think they're mad. Take, Luna, Lieutenant, join the defense; kill the bastards. If you can, capture one; I want to know EXACTLY what we're dealing with."

"And what about you?"

Ron pulled out his type-2 phaser before tapping the sword on his hip. "I'm going to make these assholes mad. Very, VERY mad."

"Understood, Ron," Takeshi replied, drawing his katana. "Good luck."

"Two sets of personal shields and a tritanium-reinforced skeleton. I'll be fine." The captain left the command center, taking a Ultimax 100 GPMG and two magazines with him.

"Are you sure he can handle himself, Mr Yamato?" Adrian asked.

"Commander, you should be more worried about what kinds of horrors he's about to inflict on the aliens," Takeshi replied, as he, Luna, and Jaden left the office.

* * *

Aliens wasted no time, for once the doors to the XCOM base split open, Sectoids, Mechtoids, Mutons and various other aliens began pushing through every access route they could find.

They had no idea what they were about to face. Yes, they had fought XCOM's teams before, and won a few battles.

Now, however, they were about to encounter something that would, perhaps, instill fear in them for the first time. Two mind-controlled XCOM personnel opened a door for the larger units, but the two were hit with a pair of orange energy beams, which knocked them to the ground. "Good evening, assholes!" A man wearing a red jacket walked toward them, holding a hyper-compact weapon, tapping on a sheathed sword on his hip. "I'm going to have to ask you all to leave, otherwise… well…" he smirked. "You're all going to die."

The Aliens paused for a moment, just a moment, before a Mechtoid walker moved ahead, and fired its dual heavy plasma cannons at Ron, who ducked to the left to avoid the blast - the rest of the alien force continuing to swarm into the base.

"Ok, gave you the choice. Time to die." He brought the blade into contact with the mechtoid, hacking through it as though it were warm butter, which disappointed the captain.

"Duranium plating with a smattering of monotanium. I'm disappointed." A thin man fired its' rifle at Ron, the plasma impacting harmlessly on his personal shields. "Oh, I'm SORRY, you thought that was going to hurt me? Too bad. You will know death."

A Sectoid Commander then moved up towards Ron, before the Starfleet Captain could react, the Commander's eyes lit up as tendrils of psionic energy stretched out from the alien's head, connecting with Ron's own.

This was a mistake. One contact was made, the commander saw everything within Ron's mind. It knew of the Ra Cailum, alternate universes… And the glorious overwhelming insanity of the Borg. Trillions of voices crying out, in harmony and anguish, obeying a single, overwhelming power.

The knowledge, the power, the madness… it was too much for the sectoid to comprehend. So it made the only option it could, running for a partly open door and sticking its' head in it.

Before promptly twisting its' body, the jammed door allowing it to kill itself.

Ron blinked, he could tell that the alien just tried to get into his head… but everything that happened _after_ was the exact opposite of what he was expecting. "So, I'm not just walking cybernetic death, but I'm walking PSIONIC death." The grin on his face that appeared unsettled the aliens. "So… **_Who wants daddy's belt_**?!"

* * *

Inhuman screams caught the attention of the defenders, making Takeshi chuckle slightly. "I think the dumb morons just encountered Ron's immunity to telepathy. Or at least his ability to drive telepaths that try to get into his mind completely bonkers."

Jaden smashed the skull of another Sectoid with his boot, opening fire at the Floaters in the sky with his MA37, bringing them down. "What do you mean?" He asked, priming a grenade, before tossing it forward, the blast catching a Muton in the face blasting its upper body into pieces.

"Ron's an ex-Borg drone with a LOT of collective knowledge," Takeshi explained. "No telepath I know can handle the 'song' of the Collective or the knowledge in his brain all in one sitting and NOT get driven to insanity."

Jaden paused for a moment, before sighing. "Fuck it, I'm getting tired of this bullshit," he muttered, pulling out his Grenade Launcher, and firing off a blast which shot off the legs of a Berserker. "You guys never seem to run out of crazy ass shit…"

Takeshi chuckled. "Sometimes they say the _Enterprise_ gets all the interesting assignments," he remarked. "Ron's fond of saying that we get the crazy that passes the _Enterprise_ by."

That explained a few things.

As they moved up towards the Geoscape room, they heard additional gunfire and arrived to see Alpha Squad battling it out against the Aliens along with several XCOM Security Guards.

"Nice of you to join the party! We've got a lot of these bastards trying to get deeper into the base, but something freaky's going on."

"Define 'freaky', Colonel; you've got aliens in your base trying to kill you."

Kelly ignored Luna's sarcasm. "Some of the assholes are shooting at each other! Now, I'm not one to argue with a gift horse, but this is weird."

"…Okay, either Ron's managed to inject some of these aliens with his nanoprobes, or there was a particularly nasty backfire of a mind-control attempt," Takeshi remarked after a moment.

Two command sectoids took cover behind a pair of crates, Luna's sharp eyes spotting something on their bodies.

Gray mottling and grey-green implants. "Ron didn't just take any of them; he took the psionic ones! He must've assimilated them and, well, you get the idea." They did; while their knowledge of Trek was limited, they knew that Borg technology suppressed one's mind and put them under the control of the collective. This was a modified version of the concept; the only difference was Ron was controlling the commanders, and while usually unethical, the bastards deserved far worse.

"Well, this makes things easier for us then!" the Colonel shouted, before he whistled. "Isabelle! Do your thing!"

From atop the rafters, a woman with a sniper rifle descended from a grappling hook, wearing some type of armor they had yet to see before. "With pleasure," She said, smirking as her eyes flared purple for a moment, much to the Starfleet personnel's surprise.

"Wait… humans can have those Psionic powers too?" Luna asked in surprise.

As an answer, Isabelle looked at a wounded Muton that was starting to stand back up. She outreached her hand, and tendrils of Psionic energy connected with the Muton, as it stood up straight. She then nodded, and the Muton then joined the Sectoid Commanders in fighting the other aliens. "Pretty much," she said.

Takeshi pondered that a moment, before he nodded. "Interesting," he said. "We'll need to hear the full story later."

A thin man fired at one of the assimilated commanders, impacting the head, but all it did was hit a shield. "He added Borg shields. Do these guys use projectile weapons?!"

"Nope!"

"And they can't remodulate. They're screwed." The assimilated sectoids sent out another wave to hijack a pair of thin men, who immediately obeyed and joined their traitorous comrades.

"Sometimes you get the bear…" A phaser beam decapitated a Muton as Ron entered the bay, his kilij dripping with alien blood. "And the rest of the time the bear fucks you. How's it hangin', kiddos?"

"Doing alright," Takeshi replied. "We're slowly but surely pushing them back, with help from you and your assimilated minions."

"I can add to that little army if you just stun the commanders and leave them to me."

Jaden blanched. "That's a bit sickening."

"I don't like it, personally, but I'd rather have these assholes shooting for us then AT us, if you ask me, Lieutenant."

"Agreed," The Colonel nodded. "Better than having them take over _our_ minds - it's happened more often than you think with those Commanders."

One commander, which avoided their fire, was stunned by one of the converted commanders, then dragged over to Ron. "Turnabout THIS intruder, asshole." He extended his tubules into the commander, adding it to the 'Alien XCOM Army', as Kelly was coining it. "Go, little one. Add to the defenders of this world and fuck up your old masters." The alien crawled away, jumping into one of the vents.

"When you got lemons, make lemonade, right? Or combustible ones. Whichever works."

"I still can't believe you actually managed to make exploding Tribbles," Takeshi muttered under his breath.

"That's… really creepy. You're using the enemy against the enemy."

"I'm using incredibly insidious technology to turn your enemy into your friend. Trust me, it's not something I like; I can barely control this shit at the best of times. I need to program the nanoprobes before I inject them into anything, otherwise we've got a problem."

"I won't complain," Jaden said as he fired his Magnum to the side without looking, scoring a headshot against a Floater. "So long as he keeps doing it against aliens and not _us_."

Takeshi nodded. "That's usually the attitude we take toward it," he admitted.

"You know me, don't stick the crew if you got a choice, Take." The aliens began sweeping the base, unnerving the XCOM personnel they ran into and occasionally taking a few shots.

" _This is the Commander: I've got aliens shooting at aliens. Would someone tell me what the hell's going on?_ "

"Commander, this is Captain Pinkerton: that would be my doing. Managed to take over a few psionic assholes, and I've turned them against their masters. You're welcome for the help, by the way."

There was a short pause, before they heard a sigh. " _Well either way, keep doing whatever the hell it is you're doing,_ " he said. " _We've almost pushed these assholes out the door!_ "

"Leave it to me, Commander: just make sure you clean up the mess." A floater croaked before Ron walked over to the damaged flyer, kneeling before it. "Hello. You must be wondering, 'who is this human? Why is he talking to me? Why should I care?' Well, here are the answers to all three questions: my name is Ronald Pinkerton, I have something to tell you and the reason you should care is the thing I have to tell you." He smiled before his artificial right eye's iris glowed green and red.

The colors of the Borg. "Resistance is and always has been… Futile." He injected the floater with nanoprobes, the creature screaming the entire time, wanting the help of its' masters.

But Ron said it best. "Your masters don't care, buddy. Welcome to my service."

Takeshi shivered a bit. It was always a bit creepy whenever Ron did that. "OK, let's mop the rest of these guys up."

* * *

Half an hour later, the base was cleared out, and the assimilated aliens and their thralls were dead, as without a control signal from Ron, they terminated, and what they were connected to died with them. Which was the whole point: the enemy used them as disposable weapons, all Ron did was turn them against their masters.

Now, it was damage control time as engineers began repairing the damage that the aliens had done to the base. As the Commander met with Bradford and the rest of the command staff plus the Starfleet personnel in the Geoscape room.

"Having to fight our own people… " Dr. Shen muttered as Vahlen checked up on one of the now liberated officers who were taken over by the aliens.

"Will he be alright, doctor?" Bradford asked.

Vahlen sighed, standing up "Yes, I believe he and the rest of the personnel who were… controlled should make a full recovery in time." She said, "They are all free from outside control now."

"Is there any indication how this happened, Doctor?" Shen asked.

"I finished our initial scans," she informed. "And so far I have found no physical abnormalities."

"We already know the aliens are capable of using psionics for mind control," Bradford pointed out.

"Yes, but that is only when in close proximity," Adrian informed. "Every time we engage the psionic-capable aliens, they have to have some form of line-of-sight with our people to initiate control, and even that is only with one person at a time. Never something to this scale."

Shen nodded. "If the aliens were capable of launching this type of attack before, they would have done so a long time ago," he said. "Perhaps this was a one-time opportunity?"

"While that seems to be the most likely probability, we still need to figure out how they pulled it off to begin with." Adrian said. "We need to make sure the aliens can't pull off another stunt like this again."

"Indeed. I've taken the liberty of recovering the corpses of the aliens Captain Pinkerton… somehow took control of—"

"You won't get anything out of them." Both turned their attention to the captain, who, with his first officer, security chief and UNSC honor guard, entered the briefing room. "I programmed the nanoprobes and any technology created by them to denaturate. In a matter of hours, they'll be as useless as their plasma weaponry is to my Borg shields. Not that it wasn't useless to begin with: I've got shielding equal to that of a freaking shuttlecraft."

Before Vahlen could ask, Adrian rose his hand. "It's… Star Trek stuff, Doctor," he said. "I'll send you the link to the Memory Alpha website once the internet is back up."

The german doctor sighed. "The universe is filled with strange things…" she muttered, before there was a loud mechanical whirring sound, before the Geoscape map lit back up.

"I'll be sending down a few replicated phase pulse rifles and phase pistols in a few hours, Commander. Personal shields are out of the question, seeing as they aren't a 22nd Century thing, but I'll see about specs for early shielding. And… ships. I think you'd love to command an NX-Class cruiser, Commander."

The Commander's face was priceless, looking at Ron with wide eyes and a gaping mouth. It took a whole minute before he was able to say anything. "…I want it named _Avenger_."

"Done."

"You are fucking _awesome_."

Takeshi and Luna groaned. "Don't compliment him; it'll go to his head."

"Too late; not letting it inflate my ego. We've got work to do. I'll send Sonja down here with a detail to get your asses suited up with a transporter. Count yourselves lucky that thing is from the 22nd Century."

All four turned to leave the base, but before they got out of earshot, they heard a VERY loud whoop. "Sometimes life is awesome."

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: Who would have expected that Star Trek exists in this instance of the XCOM universe?**

 **…okay, maybe it isn't _too_ farfetched - honestly, I'm sorta counting XCOM as a similar premise to Stargate in terms of humanity, and Star Trek exists in Stargate.**

 **117Jorn: Yeah, same thing goes for Halo. I mean, it IS modern day earth, why WOULDN'T they have ST, Halo, exe?**

 **Ron the True Fan: Ron's comment said it best: all things are both reality and fiction. I just hope our universe has a REALLY good author.**

 **117Jorn: *Looks up* I swear if that fucker kills me off…**

 **Ron the True Fan: We all leave the stage eventually. Doesn't mean we're not putting on a good show! See you next time!**

 **Ja Ne!**


	8. Chapter 8

**Time/Date: 2015 AD**

 **Location: Sol System, Mars surface**

* * *

While most would label Mars' surface romantically, it was a cold, dusty, dark, and very bad place to be. Oxygen was overruled by Co2 and sandstorms beat the crap out of anything on the ground.

But titanium-A hull plating made a VERY good shield in conjunction with Federation deflector shielding, Drake noted as he stared out the forward viewport of the UNSC _Saratoga_ over Utopia Planitia, where, in the UFP timeline, a major shipyard facility gave birth to many classes of starship, including the _Intrepid_ and _Galaxy_ -Classes.

Now, it served as the hiding place for the UNSC ships, as they stayed put as the _Ra Cailum_ handled what was going on at Earth. While they obviously couldn't leave to go outside, they were still safe from any alien attacks - especially with the upgrades currently being fielded across the combat-capable ships.

The _Saratoga, Providence,_ and _Jericho_ were all getting a decent Starfleet retrofit to let them stand a bit closer to Starfleet Standards. While not much could be done for their Titanium Armor, the engineers were able to retrofit other bits of technology, including Phaser turrets, a few photon torpedo launchers, deflector shields among other things.

And all it took was for Drake to accept Ron's offer of asylum. It felt like a betrayal, but to be honest, it was better than the UNSC would do. At least Ron was up front about the truth and didn't bullshit like ONI did.

"Captain, we're picking up a transmission from the Ra Cailum. Captain Pinkerton on the line."

Drake nodded "Patch it through," He said, turning to face the main screen, which then displayed the Starfleet captain that was very quickly becoming the UNSC Personnel's BFF. "Captain, what's the situation over there?"

"We've made contact with the locals; they've got a bit of an alien infestation over here, and I bet your Marines and ODSTs are getting bored. I'll supply the guns, you supply me anyone who wants to shoot anything non-Terran not wearing a Starfleet uniform." Another thing they liked about him: he thought they'd refuse a chance to shoot anything that was a threat to Earth.

Like hell they'd pass THAT up.

"I'll send word to the others," Drake nodded "They'll be more than happy to be the ones kicking alien ass for once."

"Fun times. I'd go down there myself, but… Sonja REALLY doesn't want to push The Button." Drake didn't want to know, and was spared the chance to ask. "Call me when your people are ready for transport. Pinkerton out." The call ended, and Drake drew up a short list.

All of them Spartans.

"Get the Spartans suited up for deployment," he informed. "And send word to Tarkov to get his best men prepped as well."

* * *

 **XCOM GHQ**

* * *

Sonja held up a weapon she barely considered a weapon: the 22nd century phase pistol. While it was the ancestor to the phasers they used, issues with the weapon caused them to be phased out of service in 2178, forcing them to use modified hadron-infused pulse laser weapons until 2250, when the refined phaser entered service almost 70 years later.

She'd made the improvements to the weapons, as well as the phase rifles, bringing them just barely to spec, but it would just be easier to give them disruptor technology. The Klingons and Romulans wouldn't mind.

…Actually, NO ONE would mind. Almost everyone used disruptors. The only reason the Kazon didn't was the fact that the Trabe developed phaser technology.

"I KNOW that these are supposed to be more advanced and all… " One of the XCOM soldiers mused as they investigated one of the rifles, "But… I still kinda like our old rifles a bit more… they have more kick to them."

"Kick equals lack of accuracy. It's why these things phased out the EM-33 in 2151." She grabbed one of the XCOM plasma rifles, firing at a tritanium-ceramic target, hitting above the center before unceremoniously dropping the weapon and picking up a phase pistol and firing at the same target, hitting the center. "No recoil, better accuracy. Better accuracy, more chances your enemy will be dead and not you. I hope this fact gets through your head."

"…Do you have to be such a bitch?"

"Boss said it best: honesty is best. And if me being a bitch to get plain facts through your thick skulls is too much, bury yourself under a rock and stay there, ignorant to the fact that this—" She held up the phase pistol. "Is better than your guns. I can fire this thing on two settings and kill an alien or just stun it for capture. You… carry around a bulky stun gun."

"We make due with what we had," Colonel Kelley said, observing a Phase Pistol. "We understand the practicality… it's just a bit hard for some of us to move away from the classics. But so long as they can kill aliens, we won't complain."

Sonja opened up a box, withdrawing a weapon that looked vaguely familiar. A pistol grip, a top-loading helical magazine, foregrip and compact frame that was clearly designed to spew bullets was what fit snuggly in sonja's hands. "Against your enemies, our tech works better. But as you know, bullets and borg don't get along."

One of the XCOM Soldiers let out a low whistle. "Damn, is that a Calico M960?" he asked.

"Damn right. One hundred 9mm Luger rounds in the magazine, modified tritanium barrel with cryogenic cooling and a heavy-recoil damper. I almost never use it."

"Why not? It's an amazing gun!"

"Because most of the time, we never encounter the Borg and, contrary to that MMORPG, personal deflector shields work EXACTLY like their ship-sized counterparts. The bullets will not get through, and the Borg don't see the point in adapting it to their drones. No one uses projectile weapons."

The Colonel blinked, looking at Sonja "You've… been playing Star Trek Online?" He asked.

"Didn't need to; checked the wiki." Sonja shrugged. "Although the information there is out of date: the Iconian War is over, but I won't spoil it for you!" She then paused. "Though… a lot of the crew have downloaded it, been playing it like crazy… including Ron so he can relive his favorite moments to a degree. Some of the boys have been asking me and Cassie to set up a server _onboard_ the _Ra Cailum_ so they can keep playing when we leave this universe."

"I'll bet Starfleet Command is going to be weirded out."

"They're used to it coming from the _Ra Cailum_. They set up a special weirdness folder for us. I'll go talk to Shen and Vahlen. I got shit to talk to them about."

* * *

Walking through the interior of the XCOM Headquarters, Jaden couldn't help but draw parallels to the legendary CASTLE Base back on Reach. It was well fortified, concealed, and easy to defend from conventional assaults. Sure it might not stand up against Starfleet, but it proved it could handle the Aliens they just managed to fight off, and could probably stand against a Covenant assault.

However, thinking about Reach made him sigh. Here he was, a completely different _universe_ from Reach… while he was grateful for what Starfleet had done for him and the other survivors… part of him still felt as if he should never have left Reach to begin with.

The Starfleet people were more at home in this base: Sonja was busy playing with all of Dr. Shen's toys and making them better, Rutia was comparing notes with Vahlen, Takeshi and his wife were doing god knew what, and their daughter was standing right in front of him.

' _Wait, what_?' The three year old (who acted like a seven year old) was standing in front of him and Jaden didn't even notice.

Screw Elites using cloaks; this girl was the stealthiest thing in the known multiverse.

"Hello," Larcei said.

"Oh, uh… Hi Larcei," Jaden said, regaining his composure. "What are… you doing here?"

"Tou-san and kaa-san wanted to keep an eye on me, and Uncle Ron is doing his laughing thing, and he doesn't like me around when he does that." Jaden tried to picture the 'laughing thing'. All he got was Ron stabbing a Hunter to death laughing like a madman.

That was something that brought a smile to his face.

"Well… nice to see ya again," he said. "How have you been?"

"Been doing okay," Larcei replied. "Thank you again for saving me from those bad aliens."

"Ah, it was nothing," he shrugged. "It's my job to keep people safe."

She smiled, before hugging his leg. "Regardless, it was really brave of you," she said. "Thank you very much… Jaden-nii-san."

Jaden blinked, not exactly sure how to react to this. Before he could say anything though, A tone sounded out over the PA. " _All personnel, report to the situation room. Repeat, all personnel, report to the situation room._ "

" _That means EVERYONE; Starfleet personnel, get your rear ends there NOW!_ "

It sounded like Ron was not in a pleasant mood if he was yelling like that over the PA.

* * *

"…EXALT?"

"Yes, that is what they call themselves," Adrian sighed, looking at the images displayed on the monitor. "We know very little about them - and every time we try to take one of their members prisoner, they kill themselves to avoid capture. They are a group dedicated to causing nothing but trouble to XCOM. While we can't say for sure that they're in league with the Aliens since we've seen them fighting them before, they've set up propaganda _against_ Council nations, sabotaging our funding, and even hacking into our own research logs, putting our research on the aliens back. "

"I've spoken with the Commander on length about this," Ron said. "In short, I want these assholes in the ground after we shoot them. Repeatedly. With a veron-T disruptor!"

"Ok, someone's mad," Adrian said, before continuing "We have an operative on the inside, callsign Scarecrow. We want him recovered. We've got almost no intel on these bastards, and he's our only shot at getting it. Unless anyone wants to see someone suffer through the Borg treatment."

"There is another mission," Adrian informed, pulling up a map of France. "Scarecrow sent us one more message before he told us his cover was blown. EXALT was transporting… _something_ across a Dam here in France, but Aliens attacked the convoy, and the Dam. We need to deploy two teams: one to extract Scarecrow, and the other to clear the bridge of aliens - prevent the whole dam from collapsing, and figure out what EXALT was transporting that the Aliens thought was worth attacking them for."

"We've got more then enough people to hit both at the same time," Ron said. "I'll be providing intel from the Ra-Horakhty for the dam mission, so if you want air support, ask. Speaking of which, the Avenger will be ready by the end of the week. Thank God for 25th Century construction practices."

Adrian grinned. "Thanks for the update," he said. "Team Alpha-One will deploy to evac Scarecrow, while Alpha-Two will head to France." He looked at the Colonel "Colonel, you will lead Alpha-One on this mission, make sure Scarecrow is secured. Isabella will lead half of your team to head for the dam." He looked at Ron "I leave it to you who goes with with team, Captain Pinkerton."

"Take, Luna, you're going on the damn dam mission." Ron smirked "So if you screw up and get hurt, damn it, Larcei will have my damn ass."

"WHY must you do puns?"

"Genocidal aliens and retards HELPING the genocidal aliens, Take. You know what happens."

Take winced. Humor, poor and otherwise, kept Ron from turning into a one-man killing machine in these situations. "Corpie, Jaden, Sonja, you get to deal with the cowardly scarecrow."

"…Was that a reference to Wizard of Oz, boss?"

"Three guesses, first two don't count; suit up and bring me back a massive number of dead enemy corpses, please."

"I'll join the Colonel in the recovery mission then," Jaden informed. "I've dealt with groups… _similar_ to EXALT back in our universe."

"The insurrectionists, no doubt; I've read the file. Make sure they either come back to us for an actual interrogation or in body bags. Dismissed."

* * *

Takeshi and Luna were seated in the Skyranger as it moved towards the dam site. "This is how you get everywhere?" Takeshi asked.

"Yup, this here Skyranger is Big Sky's pride and joy," Isabella said, tapping the inside of the craft. "It can circumvent the entire world within 24 hours, fastest thing we've got next to the Firestorms."

"Huh," Takeshi remarked, before another topic came to mind. "So, I think we have a bit of time… think you could give me a bit more of an explanation on the topic of Psionics?"

"Hm?" Isabelle asked, before shrugging "Well… the Doctor would be a better person to ask, but… the way I understand, Psionics were first discovered when the aliens attacked us… Sectoids showed they have some sort of telepathic ability, while the Commanders were capable of outright mind-control and loads of other abilities. When we killed our first Sectoid commander, the Doctor was able to determine that humans possess the potential to achieve a similar psionic potential." She flexed her hands, as psionic energy flew between her fingers. "I was one of the first to ever awaken these powers… they gave us the fighting chance we needed against the X-Rays."

"Interesting," Takeshi mused. "…is there a chance that humans not native to this dimension could have Psionics, too?"

Isabelle shrugged. "Probably," she said. "We didn't exactly expect you guys to pop in out of nowhere and help. As far as we know we've got the same biology so… it's possible."

"What are the requirements?" Luna asked.

"Well… the Doc always said something about Willpower being a major factor," she informed. "We'd often look at any of our people that the aliens tried pulling some Psionic BS on but manage to fight 'em out."

Takeshi nodded. "Well, I managed to fight off a mind control attempt during our first encounter here," he mentioned. "So I should be covered in that department." He paused. "Also, I have something called Spatial Awareness - I'm able to sense hostile intent directed in my direction, and presences to a degree."

"Oh! Like a Newtype?" An XCOM trooper asked, causing the others to look at the soldier in question. "Oh, umm… you know, like in… Gundam?"

"Gun… dam?" Takeshi asked. "That another sci-fi show around here?"

"Yeah! Big giant robots fighting, space opera, all sorts of cool stuff!" the Soldier said. "Though in the UC continuity there were people called Newtypes which are basically humans who evolve in space to get psychic-like abilities and all."

"Huh," Takeshi remarked. "So, these 'Newtypes' could do things like I described with my Spatial Awareness?"

"Yeah, basically," he said. "Oh! And use specialized weapons like Funnel's that they can control with their minds, or DRAGOON's like in Gundam SEED… speaking of, it's kinda funny that your last name's Yamato, since the main character in _that_ series was Kira Yamato…" Takeshi blinked, but before he could respond the Soldier looked at Lunamaria. "And… holy shit I can't believe I am _just_ realizing this, but you look just like Lunamaria Hawke from the same series!"

This time it was Luna's turn to blink. "Huh… and my maiden name is Hawke…" she said. "I guess Ron's constant usage of the IDIC principle has a point."

" _Doesn't help that we grew up together!_ " Both Yamatos facepalmed as their commander spoke on the comms. " _Hope you kids don't run out of fuel before you get there!_ " The XCOM personnel would have been trying to lynch Ron for that had they not known that he could kill any of them that tried. The Skyranger's speed came at a cost: five very, _very_ thirsty engines. A large amount of the XCOM project's 800 billion US dollar budget went to the JP-7 fuel used by the Skyranger and the Interceptors, which was why there was only a handful of the transports in existence.

" _Hey, my girl here has gotten us all across the globe before!_ " The pilot - Big Sky - shouted. " _She won't go down now!_ "

"Cool it Big Sky," Isabelle said. "We'll be fine Captain, just be ready to give us some RFCAS if things go wrong." She glanced around. "While our mission is to investigate the site, we need to fix the Dam before the whole thing goes and floods the area. Sure hope you Starfleet boys can fix Dams on the fly."

"Not much we can't fix. Three hours and a working tricorder and Sonja can fix a Borg cube."

Kelly chuckled before the serious look on Takeshi's face made him go deadly pale. "She didn't actually do that, did she?"

"She did. Used it to blow up a Borg-occupied starbase we couldn't recover." Kelly's jaw figuratively hit the deck. "…You people are INSANE."

"Sometimes the crazy works," Takeshi admitted. "Anyway, let's get this mission done with, so we can get back - I'd like to talk to your Dr. Vahlen, maybe see if I could be tested for Psionics."

* * *

 **France, 4 hours later**

* * *

The Class-1 shuttle briefly touched down, the rear hatch dropping to allow the XCOM/Starfleet/UNSC attack force to drop and go. " _This is Flying Death: heading to altitude. Just remember to call for air support; I've got 20 micro-torpedoes and six phaser emitters to unleash death with. Get the informant and get to the pickup site._ "

Jaden hopped out of the shuttle "Roger, heading to rendezvous point." He said, as the other troops disembarked before the shuttle rose back up into the air.

"Let's move it," the Colonel said. "Scarecrow's transmission told us to meet him at the rally point. Keep your eyes open - EXALT probably has agents in the area already."

The team entered cover, advancing by leapfrog, encountering nothing for a few minutes. " _Hold up, people: sensors are picking up human lifesigns down there, about 60 meters ahead. And to the best of my limited knowledge, there aren't any civilians in the area. So, I'll provide target locations for you to, you know, make them die. Have fun_!"

Kelly and Jaden shared a look of horror. "This is FUN for him?"

Sonja scoffed. "Please. His hobby is making stupid things die. In this case, his hobby IS his job."

"…every time I think I've discovered the maximum amount of crazy we can ever encounter, you people always find a way to show that I've barely even _touched_ the abyss of your insanity." Jaden groaned.

"It's what we do best." Corpsa opened up her tricorder, the map area displayed on the screen. "I've got them. 20 degrees north, four contacts. Can't tell if they're hostile or not."

"Do they have G36's, UMP's, FN Minimi's and wearing business suits with bandannas over the lower half of their faces?" Kelly asked.

She pulled out her phaser rifle, a scope lifting out of the weapon before she smirked and fired a bolt. A moment later, she turned to the Colonel. "One of them doesn't have _anything_ above the neck now."

"You took off his HEAD?"

"It's currently pulling a fountain. Body'll run out of blood in a minute."

"…and here _I_ was thinking we were trying to be a bit stealthy," Jaden grumbled, "I'll advance ahead on my own, link up with Scarecrow."

Kelly nodded, preparing his laser rifle "Right, we'll draw their fire. Hopefully they'll focus more on us than you." He said, as Jaden leaped down from the building, before dashing into the shadows of an alleyway.

The EXALT idiots were spooked shitless by the decapitated man, and had taken panicked cover. One idiot even put a bullet into his own comrade by accident.

Even trainee UNSC Marines didn't make that mistake. These people weren't military; they were just doomsday prophets and alien worshipers with guns. If he had another squad of Spartans, they wouldn't stand a chance in hell.

But Jaden didn't have another squad. It was just him; the lone wolf.

…The squad killer.

* * *

The Skyranger flew low towards the Dam, touching down with the cover of several trashed cars around it. " _I'll keep her parked here!_ " Big Sky reported. " _Hit 'em hard ladies and gents!_ "

"That's why we're here. Alright, everyone, we have idiots to skin and something to steal from them. Just make sure every target you find is in my line of sight, and we won't have any problems."

"Roger," Takeshi replied. He drew his katana. "Let's get to work."

"The dam can go at any minute!" Isabelle said, pulling out her rifle. "If we release the pressure valves we can buy us some time, but we need to get this whole thing fixed before the whole thing collapses!"

" _This is the_ Isis _: we've got an engineering crew standing by to beam down, but you'll need to keep them covered. So… clear out the EXALT forces, and our people will do the rest._ "

"Solid copy, _Isis_. …Wait, not the _Ra Cailum_?"

" _The big ship's busy, so we're using the yacht._ "

Takeshi chuckled. "Not like we get much use out of the thing otherwise," he remarked, advancing along the bridge.

Bullets plinked off of Takeshi's personal shield, causing the XCOM personnel and their UNSC counterparts to jump into cover. "Everyone's favorite part of the job: cleaning up the gene pool." Luna took aim with her SRS99C, searching for some idiot stupid enough to pop his head up.

She got it, pulled the trigger and sent a 14.5mm round downrange, removing a man's head from his shoulders.

If they weren't idiots, Luna would pity them. But like every other bunch of morons she'd run into in her time as Chief Tactical Operations officer on board both of Ron's ships, all she felt was annoyance.

Takeshi dashed forward from cover to cover, popping up with his Type-2 for a shot every so often as he closed in towards melee range.

Another sickening pop signalled the death of another rogue agent, whose corpse fell just behind Takeshi from his cover up above.

"Sorry!" Takeshi shook his head. Sometimes he wondered why he married Luna. Then he remembered that Ron introduced them and basically corrupted them both by being around.

Isabella meanwhile used her Skeleton Suit's built-in grappling hook to latch onto a watchtower, flying up into it before she pulled out her rifle. "Heads up, we've got X-Ray's incoming," she warned, gazing down her scope. "Standard grouping, Sectoids and Thin Men up front, with Mechtoid's in the back with Floaters as air support."

"Understood," Takeshi reported. "Deal with them as they come into range." He managed to reach another EXALT operative, slicing them in two with his katana.

Another loud crack signalled another idiot's death at Luna's hands, and another corpse falling into the waters below. "Reloading. Projectiles are nice, but I think I should've packed a phaser rifle; I'm down to three clips of ammo!"

Another shot rang out from Isabelle's position, as her own plasma rifle fired a blast towards the approaching aliens. "Then make your shots count," The XCOM Sniper said, as her shot blasted the head off of a Mechtoid. "If you run out, punch 'em."

"Right," Luna replied. "Still… _Isis_ , in addition to the engineers, would you be up for making an Ammo Drop?"

"Depends. Where do you want it: in your hands, or their heads?"

" … Sometimes I wonder whether Ron's humor affects the entire crew. This is one of those times. Beam it down here; I'll use it to cover our teams."

A crate of ammo for Luna's SRS99C materialized beside her.

It would soon be put to good use.

* * *

They never saw him coming. As one of the only two hyper-lethal Spartans, Jaden was very, VERY good at killing people.

Insurrectionist or covenant, if they ran into him, they usually died unless his orders were to the contrary.

The EXALT troops movements were textbook, moving in a single unit securing building after building, with snipers on overwatch. However this made them predictable, just like Insurrectionists. He targeted the Snipers first - a bit of active camo let him sneak up behind them and take them out nice and quiet-like.

Then… it was the fun part, or as one of his older teammates once called "Rambo Tactics". He proceeded to pick apart the rest of the EXALT team one by one, using pre-planned traps and striking those who stray just a little too far from the rest of the group. It wasn't until there were only two EXALT operative left that they realized what was going on… and two shots from his DMR took care of them.

" _Christ, man, you remind me of what happened to that True way asshole that tried to kidnap Larcei from Earth last year_." Jaden was understandably curious about that, but as it involved Larcei in some way, it was tied to her parents and uncle killing the bastards in the most painful and stealthy way possible.

"This is Kelly: we're moving forward. Any sign of Scarecrow, Noble six?"

Jaden was about to reply, before he heard the sound of walking as he aimed his pistol down an alley "Hang on there Rambo," A voice said, as a red haired man stepped out from the shadows of the alleyway. "Don't know where XCOM got _you_ from, but glad you can take out EXALT."

"Scarecrow, I presume?" he asked, as the Agent nodded.

"In the flesh," He said, "Though the real question is who are _you_? I'm guessing you're with XCOM if you know my code name."

"SPARTAN-B312, Lieutenant," he informed. "Your Colonel is here, and we're here to pick you up."

"Spartan? Like Halo? Fuck, if this is a joke—" A phaser beam shot past the pair, followed by the Andorian woman whooping. She was probably shooting at some EXALT fool Jaden missed. Or shooting for the sake of shooting; with these people, Jaden had NO idea.

"…Was that a fucking phaser beam? Like Star Trek?"

"It's a long story, Scarecrow." The agent turned to see Colonel Kelley approach them. "Come on, we've gotta RTB. You do have the Intel, right?"

"Is the pope catholic?" The Agent smirked, nodding. "Got what I could before I was blown, we can start scratching off a few more countries off the list."

"Then let's move," Kelly nodded back to where they came, as Six and Scarecrow followed the Colonel back, yet another mission complated.

* * *

A scream echoed throughout the dam as an EXALT agent fell to his very painful death to the waters below. "As Ron would say, another successful cleansing of the gene pool. Then again, he's a bit sick that way." Luna tapped her combadge, a combination of boredom and annoyance entering her voice and facial expression. "Yamato to team: did we find whatever it was those morons were trying to sneak through here?"

" _We're finishing up with the last of the aliens - we're approaching some kind of truck,_ " Isabelle said. " _Suggest we all head here now just in case… no idea what could be inside._ "

"Isis, you may now send down engineering teams. Make sure they're all armed; the idiots might be just regrouping."

"You know Commander Henderson: we're combat engineers, we always carry at least two weapons."

Luna chuckled as she rejoined her husband. "Have fun?"

"No, not really. These people are following the aliens for… what, exactly?"

"Insanity? Delusions of power? Pure stupidity?"

"Something along those lines I guess," Takeshi remarked. "Anyway, let's see what's in that truck that was so important…"

The team assembled around the EXALT cargo truck, weapons at the ready for whatever might be inside. However as they approached, the trailer to the truck violently shook, causing the team to cease their advance.

"Careful…" Takeshi warned, as he approached the trailer hatch, opening it. He jumped back slightly when the corpse of an EXALT agent fell out, but then he heard footsteps…

…and bursting through the doors jumped out a woman, leaping over the whole team, before running forward. "Hold it!" Isabelle shouted, firing her pistol towards the runner's general direction, causing her to stop dead in her tracks.

"…Please…" The woman said, "You don't understand, I have to get to the others!"

"Calm down, ma'am." Isabelle warned, her weapon still raised - as were the others, not exactly sure _what_ to expect from this… woman. "Let us help you out here-"

"You _can't_ …." she said, looking back at them. "I… you don't get it!" Her hands balled up into fists "Do you know how many of us they've KILLED!" And with that shout, a proverbial storm of Psionic energy flashed around the woman, knocking everyone down onto their asses.

"Wow," Takeshi muttered as he stood back up. "She's gotta be some kind of Psionic… and a powerful one, too…"

The woman began to back up, and turned around to run again, but then she finally noticed the… handiwork of XCOM and Starfleet, with EXALT and Alien corpses sprawled across the streets of the dam. "You… you can kill them?" She asked, "But… how?" She shook her head. "Please, you have to help me find the others!"

"Others?" Takeshi asked. "Do you have friends that have been captured, too?"

"Look, this isn't exactly the best place to be playing 20 questions," Isabelle said, bolstering her weapon. "Come on, we'll bring her back to base and then we can sort this all out."

Takeshi nodded. "Right." He tapped his commbadge. " _Isis_ , the bridge is clear."

" _Beaming down engineering personnel now. Keep them safe._ "

"Understood," Takeshi replied, even as columns of light began depositing crewmen onto the bridge. "Ma'am, if you would please come with us."

The woman looked unsure, but Takeshi gestured out his hand. "Come on," he said reassuringly. "We're only here to help."

She hesitated for a moment longer, before nodding as she took his hand, just as the Skyranger landed nearby.

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: Two different missions dealt with at once. MAN, we're good!**

 **117Jorn: Oh please, we have a LOOOOT more ground to cover for the XCOM Arc. We've barely scratched the surface here.**

 **Ron the True Fan: Doesn't help that I haven't even finished XCOM: EU yet, so this is rather off the map for me. But that will change.**

 **117Jorn: Soon, very soon, yes. So, until next time everyone…**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**


	9. Chapter 9

**Time/Date: 2015 AD**

 **Location: Sol System, Earth**

* * *

"So… what do we know about this girl?"

Bradford looked at his datapad "The captive we recovered from EXALT and the Aliens - one Annette Durland - was passed off to the aliens by EXALT," he informed. "So far she's been less than forthcoming with how she ended up in their control, or what makes her so valuable that both sides would pursue her to this extent. Whatever the case, we need to keep a close eye on her."

The commander nodded, before looking at Doctor Vahlen. "You have anything for us, doc?" he asked.

"Although my initial observations of the abductee revealed little to explain the alien's and EXALT's ongoing interest in her, after conducting structural imaging scans of her brain, there was some evidence of focused trauma," she reported. "At this point, it is clear that she harbors some latent psionic ability, something different from what we've encountered on the field thus far. It's my hope that she'll slowly piece together what's happened."

The Commander thought about it for a moment, nodding. "For now, we will keep her here where she'll be safe," he said, "With our security plus all the Starfleet personnel here, this may be the safest place on earth at the moment."

"Understood," Bradford replied. Turning to Doctor Vahlen, he asked her, "I heard that Commander Yamato went to speak to you after the mission?"

"Yes, he did," Vahlen nodded. "He actually came to me with an interesting proposal… with your permission, he would like for me to test him for Psionic potential."

The Commander rose an eyebrow. "He wants to undergo the program?" he asked.

"Yes… he claims he has some type of sixth sense ability already," Vahlen explained. "I do not see any reason why he _wouldn't_ have Psionic powers. He may be from a different universe, but he is still just as human as any one of us so it is possible. All I require is your approval."

Adrian pondered on that for a moment, before he shrugged. "If Captain Pinkerton allows it, and Commander Yamato agrees, I have no complaints," he said.

Vahlen nodded. "Very well," she said.

Shen chose that moment to speak up. "On the topic of our Starfleet friends, I've taken one of the Phase Pistols they gave us and have begun taking it apart to see how it works," he said. "I should be able to reverse engineer it in time, and maybe make different variations on it."

The doors to the situation room opened, and in came the Crusher-dressed Trill CMO of the Starfleet ship in orbit. "Dr. Vahlen, just the woman I need to talk to."

The German shuddered as Rutia approached. "What is it, Doctor?"

"I've been looking over your psionic notes. To be perfectly honest, they're so full of holes, it's not funny, but once I filled in the many gaps, I started getting… ideas."

None of them liked the way she said 'ideas'; it was becoming clear that the crew of the _Oddy_ in orbit were a combination of batshit insane and insanely capable, and Rutia seemed a combination of Mary Shelly's Frankenstein and a few other mad doctors, with the aura of Retsu Unohana.

"I'm always looking for some outside opinions," Vahlen shrugged, "Needless to say, all of this is very new to all of us. Perhaps you'll be able to help shed some light on what I apparently missed."

"The Federation's encountered over 20 species with telepathy, some including the Vulcans and Betazoids are members of the Federation. And then there's the information in Ron's head; it's insane."

"Yes, about that… Can we—"

"No. The man is a walking, talking bomb just waiting to go off. The Borg technology inside his body can only be controlled _by_ him; the second the link is broken, it goes back to normal operations. And the Commander knows what happens when Borg technology goes back to normal operations."

"Doctor, trust me and her - it's not worth it," the Commander said. "Borg tech is on the no-fly list, it simply isn't worth it."

The doctor sighed. "Very well," she said. "Well then, Miss Rutia… shall we begin?"

* * *

Jaden had been told that this city was the home of Starfleet Command Headquarters and the Academy in the _Ra Cailum's_ home universe, but he couldn't see it.

San Francisco was just too… open. He could see it in a mountain, or a bunker deep underground, but no, SFCHQ and Starfleet Academy were out in the open, clear to be hit from orbit, which almost happened 6 years before the founding of the UFP and it actually DID happen during the Dominion War.

Though he WAS forced to admit that the Breen paid in blood for that attack on Earth: out of the nearly seven hundred ships that attacked Earth, only fifteen survived, and none of them survived the war.

"It's not like home. I miss seeing Starfleet Command."

"You'll get to see it again, Larcei," Takeshi said. "I know during the refit your uncle liked making Security mad by bringing you into the building and spying on the brass."

Jaden shook his head, as he continued to keep a watchful eye on their surroundings. While this was the 21st century, his mind told him to stay alert: anything could still go wrong, looking at every passing face and determining if they were a threat or not. Even though this was suppose to be 'shore leave' as Ron called it, he couldn't help but treat it like any other assignment. Which was why he hated the fact he was forced to head out _without_ his armor. While he could get by without it, and understood why, he just felt… naked without it.

It was like a second layer of skin… if skin were made out of titanium alloy with energy shielding and gave you enough strength to flip tanks. All he could bring was a M6G Magnum with a few clips, along with his combat knife and Kukri.

Takeshi, meanwhile, was dressed in a dark blue short-sleeved polo shirt and black pants, with black shoes, and black fingerless gloves, with his katana strapped to his back. Luna had a similar outfit, but with dark crimson as opposed to blue, and the only weapon she could carry was a small Type-1 Phaser concealed in her pocket.

"I guess it's still okay…" Larcei said, before glancing up at Jaden, smiling. "Have you ever been to San Francisco, Jaden Nii-san?"

"No… never been to Earth before," he said, shaking his head. "Always been on the move."

"Huh," Takeshi remarked. "You didn't have any academies or military facilities in San Francisco in your universe?"

"Of course we had a few normal bases," Jaden informed. "But most of our military was centered around Reach. And I was always on the move from one mission to the next in the outer colonies."

"Interesting," Luna remarked. "The differences between universes are always interesting to consider."

"I'm not an expert in this stuff," Jaden shrugged. "Until last month, the only thing I needed to worry about was how to kill a brute in ten minutes short."

They continued through the streets, blending into the crowds easily - even though Jaden got a few stares due to his above-average height and muscle mass. They passed by a market district, where people stood by tables, attempting to sell off all sorts of trinkets, home-grown food and drinks. However Larcei looked through the Market, and her eyes were caught on a kiosk which had an arrangement of jewelry. "Oooohhh… pretty…"

"20 bucks a piece," The kiosk owner said lazily, his attention more focused on the news paper in his hands.

Larcei dug into her pockets, but groaned remembering they had no money… it's the 21st century, no moneyless economy yet.

"Sold," Larcei blinked as Jaden handed the man the money in question, before picking out one of the necklaces - one with a large amethyst colored gem. "Here ya go Larcei."

Larcei squealed in joy as she took the necklace. "Thank you, Jaden-nii-san!" she told him.

Jaden chuckled a bit "Meh, what can I say?" He said, "It suits you."

Before she could form a reply, A loud, if faint, explosion sounded off in the distance, causing all motion in the market to cease. Everyone looking around in confusion, before multiple objects falling from the sky, smashing into the city, followed by what appeared to be UFO's arriving in the distance.

According to previous XCOM mission reports, this was how alien attacks in populated centers got started.

And Larcei was right in the line of fire, as Luna facepalmed, the mother quoting Starfleet's new policy. "And they keep telling us never to bring family on our ships."

"Too late to worry about it now, Luna," Takeshi replied. "Let's try and get to an emergency shelter, or at least a place where we can beam back to the ship without getting spotted."

"Not going to be easy. Ron told me about those pods; they put out a lot of EM that screws with the transporters. Ron might be able to cut through, but not us. We're going to have to fend the aliens off until reinforcements get down here."

Such was their lot in life, Takeshi mused as a plasma burst shot past them, fired by an automated drone which burst out of a dust cloud, firing at them.

Jaden pushed Larcei behind him, as he whipped out his sidearm and opened fire at the Cyberdisk, though not doing too much damage - but did get its attention as the robotic drone charged its beam cannon. "DOWN!" He shouted as he grabbed the girl, before jumping out of the way just as it opened fire - the blast hitting the building behind them, before the whole structure began to collapse. The SPARTAN acted without thinking as he leaped out of the way with Larcei in his arms as the building collapsed.

"LARCEI!" Luna and Takeshi shouted, but before they could move to check up on them the Cyberdisk opened fire on them - and soon it was joined by several drones.

"Dammit!" Takeshi yelled, drawing his sword and fending off the drones, even as Luna fired at the Cyberdisk. "Larcei! Jaden! Are you two alright?"

On the other side of the debris, the dust settled as Jaden coughed a bit, before rolling from over Larcei. "We're good!" he shouted back. "Larcei's fine! No way we're going through _that_ building though."

Takeshi did a quick check. "Looks like we can't reach you!" he yelled to the SPARTAN. "Try and find a place to hunker down! We'll meet up with you ASAP!"

"Right!" he called out, helping Larcei back to her feet. "Don't worry, I'll keep her safe!"

"You'd better!" Takeshi called out, before he and Luna began making their way through the drones.

* * *

 **USS _Ra Cailum_**

* * *

"Get a lock on our people and get them up here, NOW!"

"Sorry, sir, but the aliens seem to have caught onto how our transporters operate; those pods down there are generating EM interference that seems pretty damn well designed to counteract beaming technology."

The ex-drone slammed his head against his headrest, growling before standing up. "Prep a drop pod. I'm going down there."

* * *

 **San Francisco**

* * *

Jaden peeked from the side of a wall, looking down the streets for any sign of activity. So far, all was quiet - most of the civilians bugged out when the aliens attacked and were either running, hiding… or dead. Thankfully there weren't any bodies so far, so he didn't need to keep Larcei's eyes shut.

Not seeing any aliens, he grabbed the girl's hand. "Stick with me, kiddo," he whispered. "Just stay as quiet as possible, alright?"

"Okay," Larcei replied, holding onto Jaden's hand as if her life depended on it.

Glancing down the street one more time, he nodded before turning around the corner with Larcei in his hand as he dashed down the street - not going too fast that the little girl couldn't keep up. His eyes darting left to right as he looked for any movement that wasn't human in nature.

Rocks shifted, and Jaden caught sight of a Sectoid, who blinked before trying to take a shot at the Spartan.

It REALLY didn't get the idea that Jaden was faster than it was until Jaden lept at the alien, breaking its' wrist before removing the plasma weapon from the Sectoid's wrist. "Sorry. That won't work." A green burst exited the gun before frying the alien's brains.

Jaden took a deep breath, looking at the weapon he now had. It seemed similar to a Covenant plasma weapon, only with a bit more damage power to it. He pocketed the alien weapon. "Come on," he said, as he and Larcei continued on their way, maneuvering through the streets.

Larcei nodded, maintaining her grip on Jaden's hand as they traversed the broken landscape.

A flaming pod Jaden recognized as a SOLEV impacted the ground several streets away, taking fire from enemy plasma. It did, thankfully, take the enemy's attention and focus it on the unlucky bastard in the pod. Though the enemy appeared to be regretting it, if the alien screams were anything to go with.

"Ok, then. Aliens against one guy in a SOLEV. I'd say it was a Spartan—"

"Uncle Ron! He's keeping the bad guys away so we can get to my parents!"

Jaden thought about it for a second before realizing that Larcei's deduction, while biased, was right. Other than Jaden, Ron was pretty much the only one who could go up against an alien army alone and win.

"Come on," Jaden said, pulling on Larcei's arm "Just a little further."

Larcei nodded, as she followed Jaden as they tried to regroup with Ron - hoping in all likelihood that he'll have the means to get Larcei out of here, and get Jaden some better gear. However as they ran, Larcei looked up towards the buildings, and thought she saw tentacle-like appendages for a brief moment, before they vanished. "What was that?"

Jaden stopped as he aimed his pistol at where she indicated. He didn't see anything… but the hairs on his back were standing up straight. Someone… or rather, something, was watching them.

He positioned Larcei behind him, as they kept moving "Stay behind me..." he whispered, the Spartan's eyes scanning the area looking for any more movement…

"Okay-JADEN!" Larcei shouted, and the Spartan spun around, only to watch as a five-tendrilled creature seemed to materialize out of thin air, before grappling itself onto him, its tendrils wrapping around his neck.

Larcei screamed as she tried to back up - before something grabbed her from behind: a second Seeker, which grabbed her by the neck, and she struggled to breathe.

The human body could retain consciousness for two and a half minutes without a steady supply of air, and stay alive for a minute and a half after that. Spartans were no different, as one famously said 'even cockroaches need to breathe'. But adrenaline was a wonderful thing, as the tentacle monster was about to discover as Jaden's hand squeezed too hard around the offending appendage, detaching it completely. The creature screamed in pain for a moment.

But that moment was fleeting as Jaden fired his plasma pistol into the unholy beast, killing it. But Jaden wasn't worried about himself. Even as the tendrils of darkness that were the beginning stages of hypoxia retreated, the Spartan's attention was on the one that grabbed Larcei. Its grip was tightening… and Larcei had stopped moving.

Jaden let out a roar of rage as he leaped onto the Seeker, pulling out his knives as he stabbed it in the head. The creature let out a mechanical screaming sound, dropping Larcei. But Jaden wasn't finished as he continued to stab the Seeker again. And again, and again, and again, until its head was nothing more than a pile of scrap metal.

Six took a deep breath, before he went back to Larcei - she wasn't breathing. ' _Nonono…_ ' he thought, "No no Larcei, don't do this to me kid!"

Doing the only thing he thought he could do, he began to administer CPR, pushing against her chest to try and get her breathing again. "Come on… come on, Larcei!" he shouted. "Don't you do this to me, dammit!"

He'd lost Noble Team. He'd lost Reach. He would NOT lose anyone else!

He placed his hands over her heart and began pushing, attempting to restart Larcei's heart before breathing into her mouth, forcing air into Larcei's lungs.

The three year old girl coughed as her body restarted, Jaden sighing in relief, before realizing what her uncle would do to the aliens if he found out this happened.

"Hey, hey…" Jaden said, helping Larcei up. "It's alright, it's alright… you're safe, Larcei."

Larcei coughed a bit more, before embracing Jaden, tears streaming from her eyes as she just kept muttering "thank you" over and over. The embrace surprised him for a moment, before sighing, smiling slightly as he returned it, rubbing her back. "Not a problem, kid," he said. "It's what I do." Picking up his sidearm, he picked Larcei up before he continued on towards where Ron's pod dropped.

Larcei held onto his arm again, holding him closely and keeping her eyes open for anything else.

Thuds were heard as something massive approached, and Jaden's eyes widened when a sectopod approached, as he was woefully undergunned compared to the machine he now faced.

" _At least you kept Larcei safe, Spartan._ " Jaden was taken apart by the sectopod speaking, and if he wasn't mistaken, it was—

"Uncle Ron!"

" _Hello, Larcei. Sorry for spooking you; I hijacked a few of these freaking things and put them to work murdering the aliens. Pure technology against a borg drone. Mistake. You do NOT want to know the pains I went through to give this thing the ability to communicate._ "

Jaden let out a long tired sigh of relief, having never been so happy to hear from Ron. "Any help is good help," he muttered. "Please tell me you've got a way to beam Larcei out of here ASAP - those pods the aliens landed everywhere prevent us from contacting anything outside the city."

" _Well, now that I've got a lock on you, hand this over to Larcei._ " A small projectile launched out of the 'pod's missile launcher, hitting the ground with a light thud. " _I modified it with a isolinear transponder; it'll cut through the interference. I want my niece the hell out of there, so kindly hand it over._ "

Jaden had heard Ron angry before (his tirade against ONI scared everyone) but this was BEYOND that. He feared that if he disobeyed, the sectopod's most-likely upgraded weapons would vaporize him.

An illogical fear, but this was a man prone to extreme measures, so he just handed the dud to Larcei.

" _I'll see you back on the ship, little one. And the next time you want to go somewhere… Ask me first, dear heart._ "

"O… okay…" Larcei replied, before she was beamed back to the ship.

"Well, now that's taken care of…" Jaden said, looking back up at the Sectopod… or perhaps it should now be called a Ron-o-pod now. "Anyway you can beam down my gear?"

"Thought you'd never ask." A shower of light dropped the Mk V(B) armor, now retrofit to the standards of the Military Assault Command Operations (MACO, for the acronym crazed) semi-powered armor used by the Starfleet Marine elite, with a modified phaser rifle resting beside it. "So, did those things hurt my niece?"

Jaden's face drained of color. "They did, didn't they?" Jaden simply nodded. "…Well, you killed them, so you get brownie points. The assholes that dare hurt my family, on the other hand… They won't suffer. For long."

"Then we've got work to do," Jaden said, as he quickly suited up with the armor. "Takeshi and Luna were last by Clay Street, we should try and meet up with them by Alta Plaza."

"Then you've got a ride. Hop on; I modified the turrets so you can drive this thing. Think of it like a bipedal tank."

The Spartan got a slightly uncomfortable reminder of the infamous Type-47 Scarab Ultra Heavy Assault Platform, but unlike the Covie model, this thing was smaller and upgraded by Ron.

"Okay… let's give this a test run…" he said, as he climbed into the Sectopod. "Alright so is this the clutch-" Suddenly the machine began moving forward. "OKAY WE'RE DRIVING!"

* * *

It is said that hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.

That had NOTHING on a pair of angry parents. While they avoided the sectopods (Ron was hijacking those in DROVES) everything else was free game, especially as Luna managed to kill a muton and was using its' plasma rifle to lethal effectiveness.

Takeshi, meanwhile, was carving the aliens that got too close like a normal person would carve a Thanksgiving Turkey. They were steadily making their way down the street, hoping to find Jaden and Larcei again.

Thuds were heard as a sectopod ran into a building, Jaden on top of it. "WHY is this thing a bitch to drive?!" he shouted from on top of the Mech.

Luna fired at another thin man, decapitating it before quipping "He's as bad a driver as you are with Ron's Black Alligator."

Takeshi groaned. "Do you HAVE to bring that up?"

"You crashed an attack helicopter that Ron and I worked on for FIVE YEARS. You're lucky the only thing you suffered was being chased all over San Francisco."

Takeshi sighed. "Whatever," he said. "Come on, let's get over to him."

Jaden backed the Pod up from the building he crashed into, "Oh you have GOT to be shitting me... " he muttered, shaking his head as he looked at the controls. "…huh, what does this button-" Suddenly the legs of the Sectopod shot upwards as the pod suddenly stood at two stories high. "HOLY SHIT!"

"Yup, Ron modified that thing. The MACOs'll be happy; he's giving them a bunch of biped tanks."

More Ron-o-pods approached, Ron riding one of them, holding his rifle like a cowboy would his Colt SAA. "Larcei's back on the ship. The next time she wants to go ANYWHERE, tell me first. She nearly died from what little I got from Jaden."

At that point, Takeshi's eyes narrowed. He turned to Jaden. "I assume you managed to keep her alive?" he asked. At Jaden's frantic nodding, Takeshi nodded in return. "Then I thank you. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to make like Sanger motherfrakking Zonvolt and Cleave me some Evil."

More transporter 'showers' dropped in dozens of MACOs and ODSTs, including the idiots from before. "You!"

"I don't have time to deal with you, Sergeant. And you two are going back to the ship." Luna growled before Ron shut her up. "What would you prefer, your daughter scared out of her mind, waiting for you while you kill things, or a calm Larcei surrounded by her family?"

Takeshi took a moment to consider this, before he nodded. "You… you have a point, Ron…" he said finally. "As much as I'd like to leave the aliens attacking this city in bloody chunks… Larcei needs us more."

"Which is why I'm joining you. I'll leave the 'pods to support the allied forces." Ron looked at Jaden, turning his body to face the Spartan. "Staying down here, Spartan?"

"Why wouldn't I?" Jaden shrugged. "We still gotta clear the city of Xeno's. Job's not finished yet."

"For Larcei's sake. She might be mature for a three year old, but she's still a child. But I'll tell her you're safe; I'm looking after you. She'll believe me."

That made sense, as Jaden facepalmed before Ron chuckled. "Don't worry, she'll just tackle-hug you when you get back." Ron tapped his commbadge before the three Starfleet officers disappeared.

One of the Theta Team Marines (the 'idiots', as Ron coined them) handed Jaden a DMR. Jaden nodded, accepting the rifle - advanced or not, he just preferred UNSC-grade gear. "Let's get to work people," he said, "We ain't getting paid by the hour here!"

If the aliens knew how to be afraid… they would be. Sucks to be them, don't it?

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: Well, you know what time it is.**

 **Ron the True Fan: Rape, rape-rape-rape, raaaaaaaaaape~!** (sung to the Donkey Kong level start theme)

 **117Jorn: *sigh* he loves that song too much… anyways! We continue on with the XCOM Arc as we get ever closer to the end of the alien invasion! What will be different, what will be the same? Find out next week! Until then…**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**


	10. Chapter 10

**Time/Date: 2015 AD**

 **Location: Sol System, Earth**

* * *

Takeshi and Luna had spent the rest of the day on the _Ra Cailum_ with Larcei, but now the pair were in the XCOM base, as preparations were made to begin Takeshi's Psionic Testing.

"I shouldn't take more than a couple of days," Takeshi told Luna. "According to Vahlen, the process used to take about a week, but Rutia's helped streamline their testing procedures."

"Helps that we've got all that psionic data Ron managed to keep from that cube where they assimilated that undine. Among the rest of the data from his… experiences."

"You mean during his time as a drone."

Luna shrugged. "He's still got problems reconciling that. Doesn't help that Command literally put him in command of the old Ra Cailum days after he checked out of major surgery. Anything you need while you're in there?"

"Just one thing," Takeshi said. "I need you to do something regarding the aliens for me."

"What?" Luna asked.

Takeshi's expression turned grim. "Those who see the Delta Arrow shall not live to tell of it," he told her.

"…At times, I question why I married you. Sometimes, you're such a drama queen."

Takeshi smiled. "You know you love it," he said, before he kissed her.

It would be the last kiss the two would be able to share for the next couple of days.

* * *

T'sani was resisting the urge to go 'fuck it' and just mind meld with Annette. It would get the information they wanted, Ron would be off her back about it and she could go back to the Ra Cailum.

But it would cause mental damage, and that was something no one wanted.

"So… you recall details of the attack on XCOM's base?" T'Sani asked the human woman, who sat in the chair across from her.

Annette nodded. "I… think I do," she said. "I keep having… dreams, of the XCOM base… things on fire, the aliens and… I saw people in XCOM uniforms, and those… Starfleet ones too… but I wasn't…"

"You weren't there, that much we know," T'Sani said. "But the fact you have the memories of the base attack does mean there may be a connection between you and the attack itself…" She then shook her head. "But let's not get ahead of ourselves - what was your connection with EXALT?"

"We… were all taken." She said, shaking her head "A year ago… they met with the aliens, and just… handed us off to them. Then the pain and… then EXALT attacked the ship they held me in… trying to take me and the others back… I thought they were trying to help us, but… " she shook her head.

"You don't have to worry about them anymore," T'Sani reassured. "And with your help we promise to save your friends too."

The partly psionic woman dipped her head down and started crying.

"Look, my captain wants to find the ones who did this to you and your friends, then introduce them to his sword. And maybe a photon torpedo apiece; he's unpredictable that way. My point is, the captain will make rescuing your friends his priority, but he can't do anything without telling us what we need to know. There's over seven billion people on Earth; finding your friends is going to be hard unless you narrow down the location."

"All… all I know is that they were… on a ship," Annette confirmed. "I… I think it was a ship, it was… alien… it felt like we were always moving…"

T'sani knew only one thing. Her boss, as Sonja called their CO, was going to be PISSED.

* * *

"Due to the limitations of your scanning technology and the fact that these sons of bitches are actively avoiding the _Ra Cailum_ , I can only presume they know we can detect their ship if they are on the same side of the planet." Sonja handed Vahlen a PADD, which contained modified sensor systems. "So, we're going to cheat like a motherfucker, and hook in their own technology into your global scanners. This 'hyperwave' relay emits a deep-probe subspace pulse, and will pick up anything." The engineer made a cutesy pose before the German scientist. "Can we take this thing up to my ship before we hook it in? I can reverse engineer their sensor tech to improve our own, as it's pretty advanced, even for us."

"Be my guest," Vahlen said. "It's the least we can offer for all the help you've given us - at least until the Commander gets the go-ahead to allow us to share Meld with you."

"We've got Ron's Borg shit; I don't think we need it."

"But with the dangers you so keep telling us about, why?" Sonja chuckled as she pulled up a set of transporter enhancers.

"Because I don't trust that meld shit, and to be honest, you're fucking INSANE for using it. Sure, Borg technology is impossible for anyone but a Borg drone to control, but, freed or not, Ron IS Borg. He has absolute control of the nanoprobes as long as he knows about them. Say someone takes a blood sample without his knowledge: the nanoprobes break out, assimilate, and you're fucked."

"All the more reason why your Borg tech sounds far more dangerous compared to Meld," Vahlen said, "Meld allows for near perfect merging of biological and mechanical materials without the potential risks Borg tech brings. Perhaps you'll think differently once I finally get some samples for you, Miss Henderson."

"It's either Sonja or Commander. My surname almost never gets used."

"SONJA!"

The hispanic woman chuckled as Luna yelled her name. "My first name's also MUCH more fun to yell. It's not Khan quality, but what can you do?"

The redhead entered the lab, carrying her now-trademark SRS99C. "I need you to modify this thing."

"With what? Extended magazine, better sights, gauss railing?"

"Yes," Luna replied. "And see if you can fit some kind of energy adaptor, in case we end up facing something immune to bullets - doesn't matter if it's a phaser-type adaptor or Plasma like these aliens have been using."

"Magazines'll take some doing; UNSC boys made a nice gun, but they're incompetent when it comes to how many rounds should be in the mag. Everything else I can do in an hour. Maybe less. We're beaming this thing up to the ship; want to tag along?"

Luna WAS tempted, as Ron had officially banned Larcei from leaving without him or Jaden escorting (Jaden had since been cleared for lightweight MACO armor and was now forced to carry the tiny Type-1 cricket phaser on him at all times) and she was beginning to miss her daughter.

But Larcei was perfectly safe, and knowing her semi-adopted brother, perfectly entertained on board the _Ra Cailum_ , plus there was a mission that needed to be done.

"I'll stay here," Luna said after a moment. "There's a mission coming up, and I've got some aliens to introduce to Operation Meteor protocols for Takeshi."

"Your husband is a fucking drama queen."

"I know. But he's endearing."

The engineer scoffed as she activated the enhancers. "Endearing, my ass! I'll be back with your gun and this thing as soon as I'm done looking it over!" The device, Luna's gun and Sonja disappeared in a shower of light.

"And that mouth of hers is what landed her in the stockade at Utopia Planitia in the first place."

* * *

"So we believe Annette's friends are onboard a ship?" Bradford asked the Vulcan Counselor.

"That is what I got out from her," She informed. "Unless you know of any alien facilities where they could be keeping them - but a ship would make more sense."

"We're going to need that relay online as soon as possible, then."

"Not necessarily. The Ra Cailum has two specially equipped Stalker-Class fighters with cloaking devices. We could just use one of them to track a UFO, or I can keep working with Annette."

"Hmm…" Bradford thought "Well, from what I understand on your sensors, we _could_ connect your sensors to the satellites we have in orbit around the globe, we could do a full sweep for alien ships in orbit or on the surface, and look for any with human life signs aboard."

"Well, I'm no scientist, but—" Alarms began going off, all of them focused on one thing: alien contact.

"We didn't activate the scanners. What's going on?" One of the screens had a simple message on it: datalink active from source 94517 Alpha. T'sani knew what was going on in that instant.

The captain had been thinking of tapping into the XCOM network, and use them to boost the ship's sensor range, as with the right amount of enhancement, the ship could pick up anything from the low-tech (comparatively) satellite network.

And they'd found something: a single craft, just on the outskirts of the ship's sensor range.

"I think we've found our target. Don't think your commander's going to be happy about the Captain hacking into your computers, though."

"So long as it gets results," Bradford said, "Status on that UFO?"

"Sir, the UFO is heading towards France," One of the operators said, "It looks like it's touching down near the countryside."

"It won't stay down for long. We're going to have to use the Ra Cailum's transporters to get a team there fast. It takes, what, ten seconds?"

"Five, actually, but that's more Commander Henderson's area. I'll inform Lunamaria to join your team; she's the best shot on the ship at long range."

Bradford didn't argue. "Tell Alpha Team to suit up!"

* * *

A sectoid commander was monitoring the human captives when it heard a shimmering sound. It activated its' plasma pistol and deactivated a field door to investigate.

Only to get a Kel-Tec KSG in its' face, followed by one of its' 14 12-gauge shells being unloaded into its' head.

"I still find it hard to believe you can silence a _shotgun_." Jaden whispered, before making a series of hand motions, before the squad of ODST's and XCOM Soldiers moved in behind him.

It was safe to say that the aliens knew they were there now, so they opted for speed over stealth as soon as they entered the chamber, finding several stasis pods, each occupied. "These guys put the Covenant to shame. At least they just killed you."

Jaden payed the Marine no mind as they moved into the ship - they had a limited window of opportunity, since according to scans the human captives could easily be terminated unless they can secure the control consoles of the ship. They continued to move up, before they reached a sealed door.

"Blow it." Jaden informed as two ODST's set up a breach charge on the door. A few moments later, the door exploded and the assault team charged forward. The aliens on the other side were caught by surprise, as a Thin Man tried to level their plasma rifle at them, only to get its head blown off by a Shotgun blast.

"Why didn't we just improve that thing and keep using it?" The M90 (and the '45) were wonderful weapons, but they were rather… bulky. The KSG, on the other hand, was TINY. Better for CQC.

The UNSC Marines made notes to ask Sonja for help later. They had a ship to clear. A muton and outsider entered the squad's line of sight, and one fired a burst of plasma at the Spartan, only for the giant alien to get a Spartan laser beam to the face.

The Outsider didn't get the chance to fire as a MA5B used by one of the Marines tore into it, destroying the energy being.

The assault force continued their attack, reaching the center of the ship where three pod-like devices were situated "Targets spotted!" Jaden shouted, running up to the console. "Securing them now! All teams, clear the ship out of all remaining aliens!"

Thudding was heard from the larger areas of the ship, indicating that something big was on its' way. Probably a sectopod, or muton elites.

They could be dealt with. They were not prepared to deal with the UNSC or Starfleet, as smaller aliens, mostly sectoids, entered the central corridor leading to the bridge before being mowed down. "Spartan, you're gonna need to move! We got a lot of assholes coming our way!"

"Just a minute…" Jaden said, working on the console, before it shifted from orange to green. "There we go! Purge is deactivated, pods are secured!" He pulled out is MA37 before leaping over the catwalk down ot the ground floor. Suddenly though, one of the doors blew open - the door flying over them and nearly catching an XCOM trooper in the face. There was a loud roar, and Jaden turned to see what looked like a large, red skinned Muton stepping out of the doorway, slamming its clawed fists on the ground.

"BERSERKER!" An XCOM soldier shouted, as the alien super-Muton charged at the Spartan. Jaden cursed before he leaped up just as the beast smashed its claws into the ground where he stood just moments ago, before pulling out a glowing orange grenade on his belt, tossing it at the Berserker as he soared over it. The grenade shattered upon hitting the Muton, as a blast of Napalm hit it as it was engulfed with flames. The Creature roared in pain as the fire bomb grenade burned into it, however it was far from dead yet as it turned around to assault Jaden again.

Jaden fired his assault rifle at the berserker, unloading a full clip into the beast, but the rounds only seemed to piss off the burning monster off more. He ducked and rolled to the side to avoid being bisected by the claws of the Berserker, tossing his rifle aside before he pulled out both his knife and Emile's Kukri before he leaped on top of the beast - his shields protecting him from the flames as he dug both blades into the back of the head of the creature. It struggled as it tried to yank Jaden off, but he wedged the blades into the back of the skull of the Berserker, and a few moments later, it collapsed to the floor dead.

"Jesus that thing was angry."

" _Noble Actual, this is_ Ra Cailum _Actual: I need a sitrep, Lieutenant. Are you ready for beam out?_ "

Jaden flinched at the Noble callsign, but it made sense, as he was literally the only member of noble Team left alive, and he didn't change the IFF tag. The captain just wasn't bothering to be nice about it as they were on a timetable.

"Copy that, Captain: we've got the POWs and hostiles are neutralized." BANG! "…For the most part."

" _I'll send over a few more of my security teams to secure the ship. I want that thing flying a UFP/UNSC flag, Noble._ "

Jaden snorted. At least it was easier than capturing a Covie ship with just UNSC equipment. Starfleet stuff was GLORIOUSLY overpowered.

* * *

Bradford and Sheridan listened in on the entire battle. They didn't just rescue the captives; they captured an alien ship.

"We might just survive this after all."

"Damn right, Bradford. What's the status of the _Avenger_?" The _Avenger_ , XCOM's first starship, was recently completed, and Ron, jokingly or not, had painted the damn thing in Mirror regalia.

Granting him access to their _Star Trek_ episodes may have been a bad idea. On the other hand, the ISS _Avenger_ looked SO much better than the NX-01 _Enterprise_.

And ever since Takeshi and Luna had learned about the Gundam franchise, they'd been binge-watching it when off duty. The testing meant that Takeshi was needing to postpone his binge-watching, but they'd already gone through quite a bit. It was how they'd learned of Operation Meteor protocols, after all.

"The ship'll be here in a couple of hours. It's got all the fancy bells and whistles the Ra Cailum's got, only… downgraded."

"It's from the 22nd Century; it's supposed to be inferior. At least we've got our own patrol ship."

* * *

Jaden planted his rear on a chair in what was referred to as the Officer Recreation Room. Sadly, it hid none of the facts that it was a bar for commissioned officers. There was a much larger facility near the prow of the ship, referred to by the crew as Twelve Forward, which was a historical play on words to the bars on Galaxy-Class starships, which were universally called Ten Forward due to its' location on Deck Ten.

That was where the REST of the UNSC and Starfleet personnel were, served by a Bolian woman.

The Deck two bar, which was where Jaden was, had a more… interesting barkeep. She said she was from a race of listeners, and that she and the Captain had something in common.

Jaden knew little about the El-Aurian woman, but the only thing he could think of was the Borg, and he didn't want to pry.

"Hi." Jaden jumped, nearly spilling his synthahol before he frantically looked for the stealthy-as-always Larcei.

"You really shouldn't do that."

"Uncle Ron always said that I'd be giving him heart attacks if he didn't have that super heart the Borg gave him."

Jaden's eyebrow raised before he lifted the youngest member of the crew onto one of the bar stools. "Gave it to him?"

"He was taken before I was born. I only met him after he became the captain."

Assimilated, then. Jaden had heard of the process, and seen it thanks to Ron's hijacking of alien soldiers.

"So I've heard." Jaden said, glancing at the young girl "What are you doing here though?"

"I… I wanted to talk to you, Jaden-nii-san," Larcei said. "I… I have something I want to ask you."

"Well, ask away." He said shrugging.

"Could you… teach me how to fight?" she asked.

Jaden was about to take a swig from his drink, but paused "…Excuse me?"

"I… I'm grateful to you for all the times I saved my life…" she told him, "but… I… I don't want to be a burden to anyone. I want to be able to defend myself if something happens."

Jaden looked at Larcei long and hard, before he sighed "Larcei, you're three-four years old," he said. "And I'm a trained supersoldier - me training you… won't exactly be easy for either of us. Plus I doubt your parents would ever agree to it."

"I already asked them; they said OK so long as Uncle Ron kept an eye on me." Jaden tried not to faint. He SAW what that man did to people who tried to hurt his family and wanted NONE of that.

On the other hand, the man was a realist, so… he might come out of this with his skin still attached. He hoped.

"…I'm guessing there's nothing I could say to convince you otherwise?" Jaden asked with a dry smile.

"Nope!" Jaden figured he would clear it with Ron first, but with Larcei, he now had a student.

* * *

 **Meanwhile - XCOM Headquarters**

* * *

"I believe I've finally uncovered the reason for Annette and her friend's captivity," Vahlen informed to the commander and Ron. "And the results are disturbing to say the least…"

"What is it Doc?"

"It appears that Annette and her friends had the capability to amplify the psionic abilities of others," she informed, "Which allowed the aliens to exert mental control over a number of individuals simultaneously. This is how they were able to take over the minds of so many personnel during the attack on the base… however, by doing so, the stress caused by the attack have caused Annette and her friends to suffer significant trauma to their neural tissue. They will likely never have this ability again, though they may yet hold some latent psionic aptitude."

"All sapient life has some form of psionic potential. If not, taking control of another being's mind would be impossible. Again, Doc, not news to me."

Valhen had made it her quest to stump the captain during the limited time he was here, and once more, she failed. "Then perhaps you can tell me why the aliens are abducting us, Captain."

"I'm not telepathic, Doc, but I can say this looks similar to how the Borg Queen's consciousness transfers itself from body to body." Ron informed, "Synaptic pattern displacement is not something unheard of."

"But that doesn't make sense," Adrian shook his head "If they were trying to abduct us to assimilate us or whatever, they could easily just do that - the aliens have the numerical advantage, technological advantage, and the psionic advantage at the beginning of the invasion, but they've only been abducting a settlement here, attacking a city there… it feels more as if they're testing us… like a big lab experiment for them."

The Borg drone growled at the reminder before calming. "As soon as that relay's online, we'll find the source and destroy it. I'm getting tired of this."

"Tired of what, Captain?"

"The Borg used me as an experiment by plucking out half of my brain and putting in this positronic ripoff. I'm getting tired of this shit. What about the POWs?"

Valhen looked at her datapad. "Oh, yes, they wanted to speak with the Commander and yourself."

"I have a feeling I know what this is about," Adrian sighed, standing up. "Best to get this out of the way."

"Oh, I think I know, too." The doors to the room opened, allowing the former captives entrance. "Welcome to XCOM GHQ." Two of the them pointed at Ron's Starfleet uniform, getting a smile and a laugh out of Sheridan and a prolonged groan out of Ron.

"For fuck's sakes, people, has NO ONE heard of the multiverse theory? Seriously, everything is truth and fiction in every universe. It just so happens that Gene Roddenberry created the core of mine." The captain's anger abated a moment before getting a sick smile on his face. "You do realize, of course, this means all of YOU are fictional in someone else's universe."

"Bah, I doubt that," Adrian said, shaking his head. "Aliens invading, psychics, and lasers? Sounds like crazy idea for a sci-fi franchise."

"And my universe isn't?"

"…You're a dick, Captain."

"Logic's the dick. I'm Captain Pinkerton of the Ra Cailum. Sorry I didn't take the time to visit you in the infirmary, but I had… other things to deal with. What can we do for you?"

The other POW's looked at one another, before looking at Annette, all of them nodding before the woman sighed. "Commander…" she said, standing up. "We… we were wanting to join XCOM."

Adrian sighed, having expected it "Well… as much as I would like to, don't you have families to get back to?" He asked, "I'm certain we could put you all into protective custody until this situation with the aliens is over."

"We know we have… powers, sir." Another one of the POW's said. "And you need all the help you can get to fight those… _things_ … "

"Earth is our home," Annette said. "If the aliens win… they'll capture us again, and do god knows what… we think it's in our best interest to keep us _away_ from our families for now, and… help you."

"They're right, you know." Sheridan resisted to urge to hit Ron. He wasn't siding with them; he was only going for the logic of the situation: they would hurt their families if their psionics grew out of control, and the best place for them was XCOM. For now.

"Alright. I'll get you situated. Captain, if your engineer is done with the beacon, I would like it beamed down."

"She's been waiting for the chance for the past few hours. Thanks for the use of it. I think the aliens won't like us very much."

"When Vahlen's done with what she plans on doing with it, they won't like _any_ of us in the near future," Adrian said.

"I look forward to seeing their suffering, Commander." The Captain began darkly chuckling, making Sheridan wonder whether or not Ron was Federation Starfleet…

Or Terran Imperial Starfleet.

* * *

Sonja kicked the hyperwave beacon into place, using a hyperspanner to get it into place. "Come on, damn it, GET IN THERE!"

Vahlen watched from the side as the engineer continued to try and get the Hyperwave beacon into the relay device, trying not to laugh. She was trying so hard to get it into the relay, but she started working on it before the Doctor could tell her she could simply lower it in.

"Should we… tell her?" Shen asked.

"Mmm, this is funnier." Vahlen said, pulling out a remote, before pressing the button. The Beacon restraints let go, Sonja letting out a surprised yell before it slammed into place.

The hispanic woman slowly, menacingly, turned toward Valhen. "You little german bitch."

"If you had simply waited, Commander—" A knife shot past the German doctor's head, embedding itself in the wall as Sonja began pulling out knives like mad.

"Perhaps telling her was the wiser idea—" More knives were thrown in Valhen's general direction as she fled, followed by an enraged engineering officer with a seemingly infinite number of edged weapons.

Shen shook his head at the sight. "Commander, Captain, the relay's online… and Sonja's pissed."

" _She'll make Valhen bleed a little; it's nothing the bitch doesn't deserve and you know it._ "

Shen knew the Captain was a little… nuts, but if anything, he was truthful. "I'll take your word for it. We can begin making scans now."

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: Well, that's another chapter down.**

 **Ron the True Fan: The Ethereals are NOT going to be happy. …Do we CARE?**

 **117Jorn: No, no we do not. Until next time…**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**


	11. Chapter 11

**Time/Date: 2015 AD**

 **Location: Sol System, Earth orbit - aboard _Odyssey_ -Class starship USS _Ra Cailum_**

* * *

The _Ra Cailum's_ crew were performing maintenance on the warp drive, preparing to leave after the aliens were dealt with.

At this point, Corpsa had decided to deactivate the cloaking device, more interested in actively shooting down the contacts as they appeared instead of leaving them to XCOM. On that same front, they looked forward to Takeshi's return to the ship, but not to his new psionics, if he HAD them.

"Corpsy, we've got company." Cassie spoke up, her holographic image glancing up slightly.

"First, don't call me that. Second, what are we dealing with?"

"I've got… twenty or so of those smaller UFO types - ID'd as ' _Roswell_ -class' by Adrian, a bunch more of those larger ones, plus a dozen battleships."

"You know the old saying."

"All hands, stand to battle stations?" The lights dimmed as the red alert klaxons went off.

"That's usually the captain's line. Locking phasers on closest target. Firing!"

A red-orange beam of death impacted and tore apart a Roswell scout, sending it down to Earth before it hit four more, sending them to their graves. "Five down. They have zero protection against our particle weapons. Why bother with a suicide charge?"

Plasma impacted the forward shields as a larger saucer approached the ship, grazing the shields before making it through the fluctuating protective barrier, if barely.

"Minor hull breach on upper decks," Cassie reported, "Wait… shit, borders! Lots of them!"

"Security teams, report to starboard side, decks four through seven! Intruder alert! Cassie, get the captain back up here; I'd rather him kill the aliens then yell at us later."

"Already on it, Commander, but I need to shore up the shields to prevent another boarding action."

"Get it done, Cass, or we're going to lose more people!"

* * *

 **XCOM HQ - Psi Lab**

* * *

The doors to the Psi Lab opened, and Takeshi stepped out, seeing both Luna and Ron waiting for him. "Hey," he said. "You guys been having fun?"

"Sort of. I've been busy getting my hands on every movie produced after 1945. Most of the stuff didn't survive the Third World War, but you already know that."

"You have weird hobbies, Ron."

"That, and watching Star Trek. Data is in a GREAT deal of shit when we get back. He's been lying to our faces about a mission—"

Luna put her hand on Ron's mouth, which was the only way to shut him up. "How do you feel, Takeshi?"

Takeshi smiled, and his eyes glowed. " _I feel great, Luna,_ " he said directly into Luna's mind. " _And glad to see you again._ " He then pulled her into a kiss.

Their communicators chirped for a second before Ron removed his step-sister's hand from his mouth. "Pinkerton."

" _Sir, the aliens have launched an all-out attack on the ship; minimal damage, but we have been boarded. We need you back up here, sir!_ "

"Fuckery! Lock onto our lifesigns and beam us to the closest security checkpoint near the fighting on my command! Takeshi, get your sword; Luna, no rifle."

"Come on!"

"50 cal on a starship, Luna; you will NOT be breaching the hull like you did LAST TIME!"

"Gotcha," Takeshi replied. He grabbed his sword from a locker near the lab, where he had left it before going in. "Ready when you are."

* * *

 **USS _Ra Cailum_**

* * *

MACOs and UNSC ODSTs fired on the alien invaders, killing sectoids and thin men in droves before the mutons came in. The saucer was overloaded with enemy troops, for one reason.

They were going to try and take over the Ra Cailum.

To quote many people… FUCK THAT.

"HEADSHOT!" An ODST shouted - wearing cobalt colored armor, firing their Sniper Rifle down the hallway towards attacking aliens.. Only for the shot to completely miss. "OH COME ON, WHAT THE FUCK?!"

"Church, you _suck_ using that thing…" A Cyan-colored ODST said, firing their own MA5B down the halls.

"Fuck you, I hit something!" A phaser bolt hit the muton 'Church' had failed to hit, causing the cobalt ODST to curse like an Irish trucker/sailor. "You hit the WALL, dumbass! You're as bad as Commander Yamato! He can't hit a damn thing, either!"

"Oh, fuck you, you… asshole!"

"Oh classic," The ODST muttered, before pulling out what looked like a handle-like device "Let me show you how it's done."

The ODST jumped from cover, as he charged at the Muton "Tucker you idiot-" Church began to shout, as the Muton roared as it charged to accept the challenge.

"SWISH!" Tucker shouted, activating the energy sword as he sliced off the arm of the Muton, ducking and rolling under it. As the Muton roared in anger and pain, Tucker quickly got back up as it turned to face him again, only to get the energy sword in the face.

A loud bang signaled the arrival of the Red Team, all of whom were screaming and firing their weapons. "In the name of the Red Army, DIE!"

"Sarge, there IS no Red Army!" The Red team sergeant had gone off his rocker, so trying to clear that up was… impossible.

At least he was introducing aliens to his upgraded M90 shotgun, as Ron destroyed his old M45.

"'Course there is!" Sarge replied, reloading his shotgun "We're wearing red on our armor, and that red represents the blood of our enemies! We're not going to stop until every blue is dead!"

The MACOs glanced at one another and shrugged before they continued firing on the enemy, forcing them to the rear of the deck. A large number of sectoids opened an access hatch, entering the Jefferies tube network.

Sonja was going to be pissed. Barring her, the captain was going to be pissed.

"Security to bridge: we've got intruders in the jefferies tubes! Repeat, sectoids in the tubes!"

"We got e'm!" Sarge shouted, jumping into the tubes after them. "Hey! Aliens!"

The Sectoids all looked at the armored ODST, as he hefted up his shotgun. "You just got SARGED!"

BLAM!

"…Never mind, Commander. Red Team's engaging."

"Copy. Be advised, Sonja, Lunamaria, Takeshi, and the captain have beamed back up. And the boss is MAD, so… force them in his direction. He's on Deck 8, section 32. And leave the sectopods to him; he likes making them work for us."

* * *

Another battleship drifted as the Ra Cailum disabled it before destroying another one. "Enemy vessels are backing off. About fucking time."

A moment passed before they got a commlink from XCOM GHQ, which Corpsa answered. "Ra Cailum Tactical, killing everything that shoots at us since February 2409. How may I help you?"

"Ra Cailum _, this is Commander Sheridan._ " Spoke the XCOM Commander, " _We detected the alien fleet near your ship - do you need any assistance? We can deploy Demon Squadron in one minute to your location._ "

"Oh, I think we can handle it. Mobius Squadron can deal with the ones that are trying to get away _._ "

" _…MOBIUS Squadron?_ "

"I didn't give them the name; it was Luna's idea. Send up your planes if you want, Commander; we've got other problems."

" _As in?_ "

The _Ra Cailum_ rocked as it was rammed by a scout ship, the shields holding but the kinetic force making it part of the way through. "These alien BASTARDS are on board our ship!"

" _…how the hell did they manage THAT?_ " Adrian asked. " _Nevermind - Demon Squadron is on the way, plus some extra help._ "

"Extra help?"

Adrian let out a chuckle " _Time to avenge Earth a bit,_ " he said. " _Stand by._ "

* * *

Jakob Pfeiffe, commander of the 108th Tactical Fighter Squadron assigned to the _Ra Cailum_ after the addition of the new ventral shuttlebay, was not expecting to be scrambled during a boarding action. He expected to be fighting the aliens on board.

But this was the _Ra Cailum_ ; no one thought conventionally on this ship.

" _Mobius One, this is Pyramid: sitrep_."

"We're holding off the smaller ships, ma'am." Jakob informed, as he fired his phasers at a smaller _Roswell_ -class UFO. "Looks like these guys don't have interceptors of their own, but their guns pack a punch!"

" _Copy that; cripple the smaller ships: the captain wants them intact. Something about irony being a bitch_."

This is why they liked their new captain: he was a dick to his enemies and the nicest guy in the universe to his friends. "Understood, Pyramid. Let's get em, people!" the twin pulse cannons and phaser emitters fired, hitting another Roswell, taking out its' gravity based drive, and leaving it drifting.

"Who's your daddy, bitches?!"

" _Incoming enemy reinforcements!_ " Jakob cursed as he saw several more Battleships approached… only for an orange beam of energy to pierce through the first ship. " _Huh?_ "

 **BGM: "Showdown" Star Trek: Enterprise OST**

" _HEY FUCKERS! LOOK WHO HAS STARSHIPS NOW?!_ " An _NX_ -class Cruiser came flying from earth's atmosphere, firing away its phase cannons, with the emblem of XCOM painted on the top of the hull as it fired upon the alien fleet - surrounded by a squadron of Firestorm Interceptors.

The NX was a 250 year old design, but it was still a century ahead of the aliens. It proved this by downing another battleship, sending it down in flames.

"Avenger _to_ Ra Cailum: _how're you doing_?"

" _Just fine: a few more Sectopods belong to the boss now, and let's just say that he's racking up quite the kill count. NEVER make him mad_."

One modified Roswell took a hit and was left tumbling in orbit, beginning the biggest rout in the Great Invasion. The aliens had lost. They just didn't know it yet.

* * *

Takeshi shoved the reforged blade of Akatsuki no Ken into a Muton's neck, decapitating the alien in a single blow. "Ok, this is getting annoying!"

Another phaser bolt from Luna (who was wisely forbidden by Ron to fire a high-caliber weapon on the ship, and for good reason) killed another berserker, clearing most of Deck 6.

"Yamato to Bridge, Deck 6 appears to be clear," Takeshi announced, his eyes glowing violet as his new Psionic senses swept the deck. "Where's the next hot spot?"

"Deck 8, but going down there's a bad idea."

"Cassie, WHY is it a bad idea?"

"Ron's down there. And to be honest, you might end up on the other end of either his sword or his compression rifle; he's not bothering with target ID; he's killing anything he sees. I think he deactivated his aggression inhibitor." Takeshi paled. Ron was rather violent after his rescue, and had to have a device installed to dampen it. Sonja designed and installed it, and put in something they liked to call The Button, which was usually a program in Sonja's tricorder which turned it off.

It was a last-resort sort of thing, as it meant whatever Ron saw, died, friend, foe or neutral.

"Sonja hit The Button, didn't she?" Takeshi asked, carefully.

"Not sure; too busy to notice. But she probably did; those Greys were getting close to the engineering section before Ron went on his rampage."

"Cass, we'll funnel the idiots down to deck 8; maybe the sheer number will knock ron down."

"Better hope so, Luna. Bridge out."

Bullets impacted a barely living sectoid as Jaden approached, ejecting a magazine from his DMR. "There's a fuckton of these things."

"Yeah," Takeshi replied. "And now, we have an additional objective - we have to flush all those we don't kill to Deck 8. Sonja hit The Button."

"Which button?" Jaden asked. "I heard she has like a million different 'buttons', you're gonna have to be specific."

"The one that turns off Ron's aggression inhibitor," Takeshi explained. "Right now, he's likely running around Deck 8 like Berserker from that one Anime where seven legendary heroes of the past get summoned for a free-for-all."

"…right, force them down to deck eight." Jaden sighed, reloading his rifle. "You people are _mad_ …"

"Welcome to the Ra Cailum."

* * *

A sectoid poked its' head around a corner on board the strange human ship. It was the last of its' kind on board. And it was prey.

The enraged human was hunting it, stalking the halls like an unstoppable machine that butchered everything in its' path. It had only one thought: survive and get off the ship.

It would never complete its' mission, as a forcefield activated, blocking its escape before a compression bolt decapitated it. The enraged captain panted as the rage left him and calm returned. To a point; he was STILL mad.

"Pinkerton to bridge."

"Bridge here."

"I've had enough; find out where these motherfuckers are coming from, NOW! I don't care if I have to talk to them or use biogenic weapons: ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!"

"Avenger _to_ Ra-Cailum _, I just got a message from Dr Vahlen,_ " Adrian spoke on the Comm. " _The Hyperwave Relay we set up went active. They're picking up a new contact on the Geoscape. We were just about to move to intercept - the aliens went through a lot of effort to keep this ship hidden from our sensors, so there must be something on there worth protecting._ "

"Send the targeting data; I'll send it crashing on your doorstep, if you like!"

" _You sound… mad._ "

" _Mad? No, no no. There is no word in any language, known or not, for my state of anger. I want these bastards to do one of two things: talk to us, or piss off and DIE! I'm getting tired of the unknowns in dealing with these fuckers! I want answers! And come hell or high water, SOMEONE is going to give them to me!_ "

On the ground, all XCOM personnel were shocked by the outburst. They'd never seen mad like THIS before. " _Just… disable it. Doesn't even need to hit the ground._ "

"With pleasure. Corp, you hear that?"

The Andorian groaned before she answered back with "Yes, sir, and please stop butchering my name."

"Just shoot the damn thing and get a tractor beam on it."

* * *

Thankfully, the alien ship didn't give that much of a fight in space as the _Ra Cailum_ easily disabled the vessel. Now the alien craft was situated right alongside the federation dreadnought as the boarding teams assembled.

XCOM Alpha Team was joined by MACO Team Sigma, led by, surprisingly, Corpsa, as well as the 'Red' and 'Blue' squads, who both, willingly or not, answered to Jaden. Overall command, however, led with XCOM, as Colonel was O-6, and equaled only by Ron. That being said, Starfleet was mad, and nothing was going to stop them from getting well-deserved payback.

The last people to board the _Ra Cailum_ were the Iconians during the Battle of Earth. Their Heralds stood no chance against a LOT of pissed off people with advanced weaponry.

"Expect anything in there," Colonel Kelly said, preparing his plasma rifle as he stood outside with the rest of the assault force. "The aliens went to a lot of trouble keeping this ship secret…"

Isabelle's eyes narrowed as well "There's something in there…" she muttered, her Psionic's flaring slightly. "I've got a bad feeling about this… "

"Kill everything. We're not taking prisoners." The combined team looked at Corpsa, who looked less like the peppy yet highly capable tactical officer and more like a seasoned combat-hardened warrior. "They boarded my ship and tried to kill my crewmates. I'm returning the favor." The MACOs shrugged it off: she was an Andorian; they got hotblooded when they got mad.

"You scare me."

"Believe me, that's one reason no one in our universe wants to board our ship. Energize!" The team was beamed directly onto the alien ship, much to the surprise of a number of sectoids.

That was until the boarding team opened fire, and suddenly the area was cleared of all Sectoids. "They know we're here now," Jaden muttered as he hopped over a short wall as the boarding team headed towards the center of the ship. "Red team, go down the left passageway, blue team, you go right. See anything alien, shoot to kill."

The UNSC marine sergeant saluted and racked his M90 before they were tossed a set of personal shield generators. "The fuck are these?"

"Phase-shift PSGs. They're designed to reduce psionic attacks."

"…You've got shields that protect against psionics?"

Corpsa shrugged. "They were designed to work against the Devidians. A close look at your psionic research and a few tweaks, and you've got these: anti-psionic shields. Should keep them out of your heads, in theory."

"Theory?! You're saying these dadgum things might not work?!"

"Consider it a trial by fire," Jaden shouted back, clearing another hallway vacant of enemies. "Get moving boys!"

He headed forward down the hallway, reaching what seemed to be the door to the center of the starship… he didn't know why but he felt… _something_ on the other side. "Who wants to knock?" He asked.

"Didn't Picard say the same thing before the Borg rushed at him and his team on the E?"

Sarge ignored the more cautious members of the team, rushing into the room. "For our ancestor's ancestors! CHARGE!" His Leroy Jenkins act lasted only seconds before he was psionically shoved back.

Not enough to kill him, as his armor provided some protection. But he was out of it, and his attacker, a slender being with ritual robes and a mask, faced them.

"So… kill it with fire?"

"Good thing I come prepared," Jaden smirked, pulling out the M7057 Flamethrower from his back, and pulled the trigger as he spewed out flames towards the tall alien. The alien however simply raised its hand, creating a psionic barrier which intercepted the flames like a stone wall.

Jaden cursed, looking back "The hell you waiting for?! LIGHT HIM UP!"

The marines opened fire, bullets impacting a psionic barrier. "Son of a bitch!"

"Switch to particle weapons; psionics can't stop beam weapons!"

Corpsa opened fire with her phaser rifle, clipping the being, which partially redirected the bolt. "…Ok, that's REALLY bad."

Jaden growled "Fuck this shit," He tossed his weapons aside, pulling out his knives as he charged at the alien. As he ran forward, the alien raised his other hand, as he launched psionic energy which latched onto his head… but then, the alien seemed to recoil slightly. And then Jaden heard… or, felt… _something_ in his head, which only came out as a single word before the psionic string vanished.

 _Reclaimer_.

The Spartan blinked, but shook it off before he jumped up, and jabbed his knife into the Alien's torso, as it let out a scream before it fell back, the psionic barrier failing before the alien hit the deck.

"Spartan!"

Jaden shakily got to his feet. "I'm fine."

Corpsa launched a grenade from her rifle, killing a Muton before checking on the Spartan personally. "As soon as we're done, you're going to sick bay. No buts."

The spartan shook his head, but the Andorian glared at him. "You just got psionically invaded. You're going." She tapped an earpiece, contacting the Ra Cailum. "Tactical to Ra Cailum: ship is secure." BANG! "…More or less."

"Notify XCOM, we engaged a new type of Xeno," Jaden said, kicking the dead alien. "Very strong with Psionics, I think Rutia and Vahlen are gonna want to take a look at this one… "

"Done. Secure the ship."

* * *

Ron was busy modifying his type-1 cricket (usually hidden in his boot heel) in his ready room. "Ok. Enough is enough." He left the room, reentering the bridge. "Find out where these bastards are coming from. NOW!"

"Not hard, boss."

Ron looked to Kim. "What?"

"As soon as that ship was secured, we picked up a massive ship in orbit, which coincided with a lot of seismic activity. LOTS of alien lifesigns."

"Then I have my answer. Photon torpedoes. Maximum yield."

"That won't work," Cassie shook her head. "I just finished a scan… whatever's shielding that ship, its… well, it puts the Borg to shame."

Ron walked over to her station, looking at the readings. "A phase-shunt field. Oh, that's WONDERFUL; a skintight field around a starship that makes it immune to anything. Sucks up enough power to feed a blue giant, though. Fucking thing must be drawing power directly from subspace… or an Omega molecule. Scan that thing for Omega signatures, and rotate the band width; the field polarity will make the energy signatures hard to detect."

"Sir, I barely understood what you said."

Ron chuckled. "Relax, it's pretty hard for me, too: the Borg only encountered one species that used the technology, and they disappeared soon after. I'm using what little data they collected to modify the sensors now." Ron's hands worked the controls, inputting the information they needed.

"Cassie, open a channel to that thing; I want to talk."

"Channel Open, sir."

"This is Captain Ronald Pinkerton of the USS _Ra Cailum_ ," He spoke, "I wish to speak with whoever is in command of that vessel."

There was a long pause, nothing seemed to happened before… something responded " _You… are not like the others…_ "

"No shit."

"Don't make it worse, Kimmy."

Ron glared at Cassie's holographic form and his science officer, shutting them up. "I want to know what your intentions are for this world. To that end…" He was not a diplomat. His solution to violent situations was being the most violent person around to destroy both combatants.

But when needs must… "I want to negotiate."

Again, there was a long pause, before a reply " _Come… alone._ "

"Ron, it looks like a small portion of the shield is lowering," Cassie said. "Don't tell me you're actually going to go down there…"

"Our duty is to find peaceful solutions to end conflict. Up till now, no one's been in the mood to do anything but shoot at us, so my diplomatic arsenal is… rusty. Besides, I'm the best choice for the job in case everything goes to hell: my nanoprobes can hijack their systems if need be."

"They'll be expecting you to be unarmed."

Ron smirked before walking to the rear transporter pad. "I'm a walking, talking apocalypse waiting to happen. Lock onto the unshielded area and stand by to beam me in."

Cassie shook her head "Alright… I still think this is stupid," She said, "Just don't _do_ anything stupid over there, Captain."

"First stupid thing is theirs. After that…well." He spun around to face the bridge after he entered the alcove. "Energize."

He dematerialized just as Luna and Takeshi returned to the bridge, both staring at the transporter. "What the hell is going on?"

"We detected the alien mothership, and because it's using some… phase-shunt shield, our weapons are useless, Commander. The Captain beamed over to speak with them."

"And you LET him?! He's got access to all our command codes, and I don't think any of us don't know what they do to people!"

Kim shrunk in her seat as Luna chewed her out. Takeshi put a hand on his wife's shoulder, making her look at him. "Ron will be fine. He's dealt with worse before, and we've gotten him out of there smelling like roses."

Luna quirked an eyebrow.

"…Ok, not really the most accurate term with all the blood on his person afterwards, but you get the general idea."

* * *

Rutia scanned Jaden's head for the fifth time, checking if there was anything wrong with him. The Spartan was getting… mildly annoyed by it. "Doc, I feel _fine_ ," he said. "You've checked me over at least five times now."

"I'm paranoid, alright? The last time someone was psionically attacked, they had neural energy drained from them and almost DIED."

"I'm not dead."

Rutia stared at him. "The Devidians drain your brain dry. I do not like any race that uses psionics to kill someone because they WANT to, and as we've noticed, these things have no problem in mutilating people. On that front, your neural patterns are fine, but you're wearing a cortical monitor for the next 72 hours. Doctor's orders."

Jaden sighed. "Fine, fine - if it gets me out of here." He said, looking at the time. "Plus I got that training thing with Larcei soon…"

She stuck the monitor on the back of his neck, where it began recording Jaden's EEG readings. " _Bridge to sickbay: standby for Code CI._ "

Jaden glanced at Rutia, who translated it as 'cybernetic idiot', likely referring to Ron doing something stupid. " _The Captain beamed to the alien ship to talk with them._ "

"Idiot. The only thing these people understand is experimentation and mutilation. They're little better than the Borg."

The CMO looked at Jaden. "Get your suit back on and get ready to beam over there. I want my captain back here. He's the only one NOT scared of me."

"Fine… send Larcei a message that I'll be late," Jaden groaned as he picked his helmet back up, grabbing the rest of his armor.

* * *

 **117Jorn: And now, we begin to close onto the finale of the XCOM Saga… what will happen to Ron now?**

 **Takeshi Yamato: One thing's for certain - this won't be the last time we tangle with the Ethereals.**

 **Ron The True Fan: Spoilers, Take. At any rate, our Odyssey will continue next week. Prepare yourselves!**

 **117Jorn: Until next time…**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**


	12. Chapter 12

**Time/Date: 2015 AD**

 **Location: Sol System, Earth orbit - aboard _Odyssey_ -Class starship USS _Ra Cailum_**

* * *

"So the moment he passed through… they raised the shield and we lost all contact?" Jaden asked, facepalming. " _Why_ would he do this?"

"He thought he could find out why, talk them down. He's never been given much chance to practice his diplomatic skills; everyone just shoots at him." Jaden couldn't see why Cassie would say that. Ron was an asshole; even he admitted to that fact. Sure, he was nice to his crew (yelling at Sonja notwithstanding, although she seemed to enjoy it) and doted on Larcei, but a diplomat, he was not.

"On the plus side, he's got a weapon the aliens aren't expecting." Luna pulled up images of the assimilated Ronopods, plus the other aliens he briefly took control of. "They're completely unprepared for a full on assault by Borg nanotechnology. He could set that ship to explode if he wanted to."

"That said, we need a way to get to him," Takeshi remarked. "We need to get onto that ship somehow." He looked at Rutia. "Have you and Vahlen been able to get anything from the corpse of the latest alien we've encountered? Or that device we found on the UFO it was on?"

"Psionic as all hell; I've only seen one species with more psionic potential, and the Undine won't exactly come to our rescue here. The device is keyed to telepathic transmissions; think of it like a psionic amplifier and a communicator. Personally, I want to beam it into space and torp it, but Valhen has… other ideas, so I beamed it down to XCOM GHQ."

"Wait, the Undine are the only ones with stronger psionics?"

"Yup. They just don't use anything but telepathy."

"So, how does it work?" Jaden asked.

"I believe the device is some sort of… direct-connection into the alien's psionic network," Vahlen informed, "Although we are treading into an area of highly theoretical science, we believe there is a strong indication that the aliens function under a collective consciousness, a form of social organization akin to a "hive mind" similar to the Borg or Ants. Although we've only scratched the surface in terms of developing Psionic abilities within a human subject, we've now theorized that it may be possible to join the aliens' consciousness… to tap into their "hive mind," by successfully activating this device."

"…Bad idea."

"What do you mean, Commander?"

"Hello? We've got PLENTY of experience with the Borg; the LAST time someone tried accessing their collective consciousness, they got assimilated! They upped the security after Wolf 359."

Vahlen scoffed. "We are not dealing with the Borg, Commander Henderson; these aliens have had many opportunities to take over your captain, and they failed. It's worth the risk." She then paused "We'll need to construct a chamber that minimizes the potential risks to the rest of the facility during the activation process. As it so happens, two of our brightest young minds, a team of brothers, have already conceived of just such a facility appropriate to this task."

"Then we'd need someone crazy enough to actually interact with that thing, grant access to the network, and get us an opening we can use to attack that super-ship." Jaden said, summing it all up.

"It will take time to construct the facility. Let us hope your captain comes up with an… alternate solution."

* * *

 **Temple ship**

* * *

"Just so you know… Psionics don't exactly work on me, so could you STOP WITH THE FUCKING PROBING?! Seriously, the Borg were less of a pain!"

A slender alien with an ornate helmet continued to try and fail to probe Ron's mind. "You… have great potential. Yet you will never come to it. Something prevents you…"

"That would be your mother. Would you MIND explaining to me why you're here? I came here to end this peacefully; you, on the other hand, are just making me think more and more of shooting you."

"You would not understand," the Ethereal said, hovering over to the other side of Ron. "We were cast out, forbidden to follow those who ascended. We _must_ feed upon the gifts of lesser beings… one failure after another… but this race - _your_ race, may finally achieve what we failed."

"I don't CARE. I came here to talk. Peace is my end goal here. So, why don't you explain, in as blunt terms as you can, WHY you're abducting humans and experimenting on them? And what the hell are you talking about, 'succeeding where you failed'?"

The ex-drone was getting tired of this. The Ethereal continued to make probes into his head (didn't get far, due to his near-immunity to telepathy) but he was getting one HELL of a headache.

"To help us," the Ethereal said. "They thought we would ascend… we failed, as our bodies fail… we must combine, with a species with an enduring, physical form who possesses the gift. After countless failures… we are close, ever so close to obtaining that which we have spent eons to achieve."

"…Ok, nutshell: you want to put your minds in psionic human bodies." The Ethereal said nothing. Didn't need to. "Ok, mind's made up: FUCK YOU. You remind me of that sick bastard from the Delta Quadrant, and he got what was coming to him."

"You will not leave. Your code is still usable."

"Watch me. My people are working on bypassing your shield as I speak."

"We know," the Ethereal said, looking upwards. "We sense it… they are to succeed, where we have failed… the one with the gift approaches."

* * *

Annette panted as she released control of the Ethereal device in the Gollop Chamber. She heard them… the Ethereals. And now she knew how their shields worked.

" _Annette? You alright in there?_ " The intercom spoke out with Jaden's voice.

"Fine… " the girl said, nodding "I… I have it… we can… we can pass the shields."

" _Get the data to the Ra Cailum; we can beam in and kick these bastards in the teeth!_ "

"No… they won't let us in… unless I go, too." The Psionic woman said, standing upright. "They… need me for… something, we'll use that to get in."

" _Alright then, get suited up Annette._ " Jaden said, " _I'll spread the word. We attack the ship at dawn._ "

* * *

The aliens knew better than to put him in a tank; they knew it wouldn't work, they just didn't know WHY. But they were too dumb to leave him in a room connected to the rest of the ship.

They clearly didn't learn their lesson involving the Ronopods. Or the rest of the aliens he ran into.

That, or they just didn't know it was him. Their loss. It would kill them all in the end as Ron injected the alien computer with his nanoprobes, gaining access to some of the ship's systems. "You people are retards. Come on, calvary, you can drop in any time, now…"

* * *

As the Temple ship floated over the atlantic ocean, an observer would be able to see what looked like a fleet of craft rapidly approaching the colossal vessel. A collection of D77-TC Pelican Dropships, Type-7 Shuttlecraft and various other starfleet small craft - all being lead by the Skyranger.

"Mission is simple," Jaden hollered out to the collection of ODST's in his Pelican. "We go in, and we cause as much hell against these alien assholes as we can! The XCOM Assault teams will head for the bridge with Takeshi's team, while Starfleet's MACO locate Ron. The rest of us are going to clear the ship, and capture whatever we can from it - tech, weapons, samples - _everything_."

"Oorah!" The Ra-Horakhry flew alongside, flanking the Skyranger to its' left, with the Pelican at the right. The MACOs were ready for war. The Marines, Spartans and ODSTs were making final drop checks on their gear, while XCOM… Well, they were pissed. "Enemy flagship in sight! Three minutes to landing!" For almost five weeks, they'd been fighting these aliens. They'd lost a few people in the process.

It was time for revenge.

* * *

The shuttles put down first, using their AG fields to lower down to the landing pads. The Pelicans and Skyranger were next, Marines and ODSTs filing out by the numbers, armed with MA37s, MA5Bs, DMRs and whatever else they could carry, with MACOs carrying modified phaser rifles with underbarrel grenade launchers, and XCOM led the way into the ship.

"Alright, people, this is search, rescue, and destroy! You see an X-ray, shoot it!"

Takeshi drew his sword, his eyes glowing violet as he reached out with his powers. His Psionic senses, which, as he surmised, were a much-improved version of his original Spatial Awareness, swept the corridors ahead for hostiles. Luna followed just behind him, her rifle at the ready.

"I'm picking up Ron's subspace transponder. He's 500 meters ahead, 300 meters above us." Luna looked at the added weapons she was carrying: Ron's kilij and compression rifle. He did NOT like going into combat without them, so she decided to be a nice stepsister and bring them along.

She did NOT want to be carrying them. He owed her for this.

* * *

"The New One faces the earliest effort of the Ethereal Ones, the first… failure," The Uber Ethereal spoke. "Though possessed of a certain… brilliance… they are marred by their cowardice and frailty… which made them cruel… and ultimately useless."

As the Ethereal spoke, Ron began working on the restraints. "Do you _ever_ shut up?" He growled out.

"Another attempt, this one inspired. Two subjects, each with a glaring weakness – brought together in the hopes of a symbiotic strength. And yet, this newfound power left them devoid of higher thought. Lacking in comprehension. Another… useless effort."

"No. Seriously. SHUT UP. You're getting incredibly annoying." A ping signalled that Ron had partial control of the ship, including the doors. So he shut them down, then released himself from the restraints the Mutons had put him in.

"I've played along long enough, and as negotiations appear to have broken down…" The captain grinned as a Muton elite roared, shooting at him, doing nothing but impact harmlessly against the Borg shields before it charged at him. Ron grabbed hold of its' rifle, pulling it out of the alien's grip before shooting it in the back of the head as it rammed into a wall. "Now we do it MY way."

The Uber Ethereal didn't seem to care, as it just floated off. "Long was our search… and now… with success so close at hand, we witness the fruits of our endeavor…" Ron fired a plasma rifle at the Ethereal, who merely used a psionic barrier to block the attack before disappearing down a shaft.

"Get back here, you son of a bitch, that way I can kill you as slowly as I can!"

* * *

Phaser fire disabled another sectopod, which was beamed back to one of the shuttles for transport back to the Ra Cailum. "Sir, this is getting ridiculous. Where's the captain?" Luna glared at the rookie MACO before examining the tricorder. "A floor above us." The tricorder began beeping, detecting a high energy buildup.

Like something was about to explode.

"And I think he knows that; SCATTER!"

The group all scattered and hit the floor just before the ceiling above them exploded.

"Gotta LOVE subspace transponders."

"Ron, you nearly killed us!"

The captain poked his head out of the hole he created using a plasma rifle. "Oh, please, you had PLENTY of warning. You got my compression rifle, sis?"

Luna tossed it up to him, along with his Kilij.

"Thank you. Let's find that asshole; he gave me one HELL of a headache, and that's… hard."

"I thought you got annoyed with stupidity easily."

The 41 year old captain narrowed his eyes at Luna's smirking face. "PSIONICALLY. I'm almost telepathy-proof, so that means it's a big threat. Take, you're the teep here; think you can track him down so we can stab his ass?"

Takeshi nodded. "Yeah, I can sense a powerful Psionic presence dead ahead," he said. "It's practically at the other end of the ship, though."

"Well, time to get mad." Ron jumped down, activating his compression rifle. "Let's go."

* * *

" _A curious endeavor… the search for the Gift in the most… unsavory of beings. They were little more than insects when their uplift began… And in their failure, became the most dangerous of predators… incapable of direction, understanding, they were deemed fit only to breed and die._ "

Annette growled as she used her psionics to push away a Chrysalid away from her - smashing it against a wall like a bug. "That voice is _really_ annoying me… " she said, trying to drone out the voice of the Ethereal from her head.

"These things keep getting worse: first sectoids, then thin men and mutons, cyberdisks and drones. Now Chrysalids! What's next? Sectopods?" Kelly shook his head. "Starfleet already ran into those. And they're being shipped back to the shuttles for… conversion."

Thuds were heard as a sectopod approached them from below, scanning for targets. It didn't last long as Annette crushed it with a psionic-generated gravity pulse, which caused it to compact and explode.

Suddenly they heard a familiar roar, as a pack of Muton's charged from out from the tunnels. " _Now… The New One confronts a greater threat - a rare strength, found in an easily controlled breed. And yet, they are incapable of brilliance, of independence… they will never be more than primitive warriors… serving only to fight, and die, as did those who came before them._ "

"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" Annette shouted, her eyes flaring in rage before she shot her hands forward, and a pulse of Psionic energy lashed out against the Muton's… and suddenly, they were no longer there.

" _It is as we hoped… the New One has surpassed all that have come before… and with such great confidence… so skilled with the Gift._ "

"ARG!"

"We'll find that thing and shut it up, Annette. Don't worry."

"I don't want that thing to just shut up; I want it to suffer what we suffered!"

A phaser beam vaporized another muton, which was followed by the arrival of Takeshi's team and a very annoyed Ron. "I'm in the mood to murder!"

"Then murder that fucking Ethereal that-" A Thin man jumped from out of cover to fire, but was psionically grabbed and yanked into her grasp before she began to punch his face into a pulp "KEEPS! TALKING! IN! MY! HEAD!"

"…I LIKE you." Takeshi and Luna backed away from Ron as soon as those words escaped his mouth. This disturbed Alpha Squad as well, who just stared at the captain. "What? She and I are thinking alike. I have a bone to pick with it, too."

* * *

It was waiting for them. "The New One continues to surge… to prove that this was the worthy path, that we were justified in our efforts. This will bring about our redemption, and usher in our future…"

"WILL YOU SHUT THE FUCK UP, ALREADY?!"

The door destabilized as a phaser beam shot through it, vaporizing an elite muton. "I am sick and tired of hearing your motherfuckin' voice in our motherfuckin' heads! DIE, ALREADY!"

The Uber Ethereal paid them no mind - as three more Ethereals appeared on the bridge. "Behold the greatest failure… of the Ethereal Ones…" It looked up at what looked like stasis tubes with Ethereals inside them. "We who failed to ascend as they thought we would. We who were cast out. We who were doomed to feed on the Gift of lesser beings… as we sought to uplift them… to prepare them… for what lies ahead.

The Ethereal then turned to face them, its body flaring with Psionic energy "The hunt draws to a close. It was not a vain undertaking… but a necessity, as our physical form has grown… ineffective. Our search for a perfect specimen was driven by our own crippling limitation, and now, at long last…"

Annette and Ron looked at one another, sharing one thought: kill it. "Do your thing, I'll do mine."

"My… thing?"

"Distract it."

Annette got the idea, using her psionics to maximum effect. "SHOOT EVERYTHING!" she shouted, lashing out with a psionic rift that sent anything and everything not bolted to the ground or lacking psionics flying backwards, and the XCOM team pulled out their weapons, and opened fire.

"I am in LOVE with this lady!"

Kelly shared a troubled look with Luna, who was equally as terrified by that comment.

"Oh, great," Takeshi remarked. "The first time Ron really notices women, and it HAS to be one who seems to share his unique brand of crazy!" He turned to Luna. "If we ever get back, remind me to request a transfer for both of us to another ship, so we can get FAR away from them!

"I don't think it's romantic, Takeshi; I think he just likes the fact that she wants to kill something as bad as he does! Besides, you've seen how Cassie reacts around him when she thinks we're not looking. Or bothering to notice!" Luna put another round into a Muton before Takeshi decapitated another one. His wife was right; it wasn't very often they found someone that was as willing to shove a knife into some idiot's head as Ron was.

And as everyone on the Ra Cailum could be considered somewhat sociopathic to a degree, including them, that was saying something.

There was an explosion from above, causing everyone - including the Ethereal's - to look up before ropes fell down, as ODST's and Marines rappelled down, lead by none other than Noble Six. "Surprise Motherfuckers!" The Spartan shouted, opening up with his MA37 upon the enemies below.

"I love it when Marines ruin parties. SHOOT THE THING WITH THE MASK!" Starfleet, XCOM, and UNSC personnel focused their fire, aiming, for the most part, at the Uber Ethereal. It blocked some of the fire, and in some cases, reflected it back, a stray bullet or phaser bolt coming back at them.

"Shoot it until it DIES! BURN ITS' ASS INTO THE PLATING!"

As everyone else opened fire, Takeshi concentrated, focusing his Psionic Powers. He didn't know if this would work, if it was even possible, but if it did, the element of surprise would be greatly in his favor. In a burst of purple light, he disappeared from beside Luna…

…only to reappear behind the Uber Ethereal, as he brought his sword down on the alien.

The Ethereal let out a psionic scream as Takeshi's blade dug into its legs. "This is not your path!" It hissed. "Not your purpose! You need our guidance to hone this power… without us, what are you?"

"We're Humans BITCH!" The Ethereal looked up, just in time as Annette flew up into the air, her fists glowing with Psionic energy, and delivered a punch into the Ethereal's head… knocking it clean off.

"Finally. Well, that ended well," Ron said. "Now let's-" suddenly the entire ship shuddered. "…what the fu-" the ship shuddered again. "Oh son of a- GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE!"

"All teams, All teams, GTFO!" Jaden called out on the communicator, "If you can't make it back to the ships, hijack the Alien ones docked! Move your fucking asses people!"

"MOVE IT! NOW!" Ron started running, outpacing most of them in seconds. "How the hell—" Luna answered Kelly's unfinished question. "Mk 13J motion accelerator! The only ones who can keep up with him using that thing are hovercraft going at transonic speeds! RUN!"

Annette began to follow them, however she stopped as she felt a piercing pain in her head. Followed by flashes, images… cities torn apart, the world crumbling… she looked back at the Ethereal device acting up.

"Annette!" She looked back at the Colonel, who stopped by the door.

"GO!" She shouted, using a Psionic blast to send them through the door, before using them again to seal them outside.

" _Ra Cailum_ , report!"

" _We're getting massive power fluctuations, sir! The ship's going to turn into a singularity and tear the planet apart! We still can't beam you out_ —"

"Tell the shuttles to take off! We'll hijack what few ships are still on board this thing!"

" _This is Pinkerton: get your asses down here! Either we leave together or not at all_!"

"What about Annette!?" Kelly shouted, even as they ran.

"Starfleet will try and beam her out if they can," Jaden said. "She must know something we don't!"

The Assault force double-timed it back to their craft, as several hijacked alien ships launched from the temple ship, along with the dozens of shuttles and dropships. Shortly after departing though, the Temple ship lurched once more… before it began to rise up through the atmosphere.

* * *

Sonja and Riza watched as the ship began to rise, clearing 100 angels in less then a minute. "Commander, the phase-shunt field is beginning to fluctuate."

"Enough to beam our people off, Cass?" The hologram shook her head. "No. The power levels need to drop off at least another 40% for transporter use, or anyone going through would… die like Commander Sonak did in 2273." Everyone paled at the reminder of what happened to the Enterprise's second Vulcan science officer.

What beamed back to SFC didn't live long. Fortunately.

" _Takeo to_ Ra Cailum, _most personnel have evac'ed,_ " Jaden informed. " _But Annette Durland is still onboard… we think she's controlling its ascent. Can you beam her out?_ "

"Not yet: the field needs to lose more power."

" _This is Pinkerton: Sonja, reconfigure the deflector to fire a feedback pulse modulated to 45.7 hectohertz!_ "

"What'll that do?"

" _Drain that field faster! Do it!_ "

That was no Sonja yell, but it would do. "Reconfiguring now!" Sonja said, working on the console. A few moments later, the _Ra Cailum's_ deflector dish emitted a pulse of blue energy which impacted against the temple ship's shields which flared.

"Come on, come on… " Sonja muttered, watching as the shields lowered, but their time to GTFO decreased too. "Almost… there… "

The field percentage decreased to 48%, but they needed to be at 35 for minimum safe transport. "Reroute warp power to the deflector!"

"Report!"

"I'm working on it, Boss!" The bar dropped faster, going to 37%. "Fuck it! Lock on and energize!" The rear transporter alcove activated.

Just as the temple ship exploded 350000 kilometers above the Earth's surface.

"…Transporter room? Do we have her?" Sonja asked.

There was a long pause, before the reply came " _Transporter Room here… we got her._ "

Sonja let out a relieved sigh " _Ra Cailum_ to Captain… we got her."

" _Link us to XCOM GHQ_." Corpsa gleefully did so. "Link established, Captain."

" _Commander Sheridan, this is Captain Pinkerton: the invasion is over. Repeat: it's over. …PARTY ON THE_ RA CAILUM!"

" _DAMN STRAIGHT!_ " The Commander shouted, just barely over the sound of cheers on the other end of the line. " _We'll be there ASAP! WOO!_ "

* * *

 _Captain's Log, USS_ Ra Cailum _, Stardate 87425, local date, September 1st, 2015: The invasion of earth is over. XCOM and my crew have defeated the aliens. Starfleet Command will kill me later for this, but my previous log entries will explain my actions._

 _We are making repairs to the wormhole drive in preparation to leave, leaving behind new allies, and taking on… well, the Science Council LOVES me for a reason. All that's left is a meeting with Commander Sheridan and the XCOM council, and we'll be on our way._

 _Hopefully, to our own universe…_

* * *

The situation room had the blacked out face of the Council Speaker on it, facing Ron and the Commander.

"Again, I must thank you for all you have done for us, Captain Pinkerton," The Speaker informed. "Without your aide, the conflict may have cost even more lives than we could imagine. And we assure you, that the Starfleet Prime Directive shall be upheld by the Council and XCOM."

"Make sure of it," Ron said, "Is there anything else?"

"There is one last issue," The Spokesman said, "As a token of our appreciation, we provide you with several alien ships which you may use however you see fit. Also, Colonel Kelly and Strike Team have expressed their wishes to join your crew, along with Annette Durland."

Ron rose his eyebrow "Wouldn't they want to stay here?"

"With the alien threat dealt with for now, they believe their special talents may be of better use to your people." He informed, "And Annette believes with her new Psionic powers, she may be a danger to her family in France, and owes Starfleet for saving her life from the temple ship's detonation."

"Well, I'm not the type to extort favors. If they want to join us, they should be warned that we are not returning to this universe."

"They know this, Captain, and believe they can do greater good with you then remaining here."

Ron wasn't going to turn down anyone wanting to join them, but they needed to know what they were getting into. They would probably never be coming back, and they needed to be prepared for that. "Well, if anyone wants to come with us, they need to be prepared for that. Thank you for sharing your knowledge with us."

"your gifts were more valuable, Captain. I speak for the entirety of this Council when I say that we will follow in your footsteps: humanity will come in peace to the stars."

"I damn well hope so, Speaker. You end up like the Terran Empire, you'll regret it."

"We are not that stupid, Captain." The Speaker said. "We know what happens to them - and we will not repeat it. With a galaxy as large as ours, I doubt every race we encounter will be like the Ethereals."

"Oh, I would hope so. Good day, Mr. Speaker." The call ended, the emblem of XCOM returning to the big screen. "Commander, I would like to speak with Colonel Kelly and his team, as well as Miss Durland. I want them to know EXACTLY what they're in for."

" _Understood - I'll have them beamed over ASAP._ " He said, " _They were waiting to talk to you afterall._ "

Ron sighed. "There are times I hate my job."

* * *

Strike-One, joined by Annette, stood in the conference room, the latter looking at the 15 models on the wall, all ships that bore the name enterprise, from the first US Navy clipper to bare the name to the CV-6, CVN-65 and CVN-80 aircraft carriers, the OV-101 shuttle, the NX-01 and all eight ships to have the legendary registry of NCC-1701.

The doors to the room opened, and Ron entered, foregoing the outer field jacket for the vest. "I'm sorry for calling you up here so unexpectedly. I was just informed that you… wanted to come with us."

"We figured that much." The Colonel said, before he sighed "Well… we spoke about it for a while, got the OK from the Commander and Council… with the aliens here on earth taken care of, we thought you guys might need our help… even if your next jump doesn't take you to your own universe, we think your ship would benifit better having me, my team and Annette onboard rather than just stuck at XCOM… with the aliens gone there's nothing we can really do there now. Everything else is in the hands of the Council now."

"And as Starfleet ships never have boring assignments, you figured you'd come with us." Ron sighed, "I won't deny that having you along would help. I just hope XCOM has people more than capable of taking your place."

"They do, Captain," the Colonel nodded. "We're just one team out of XCOM - there are plenty more teams just as effective as we are where we came from."

The Starfleet captain shrugged. "What the hell. Consider your applications to transfer to Starfleet accepted. There's crew quarters on Deck 5; pick a room. And visit the quartermaster's office. I think you'll want to upgrade your arms and armor." The XCOM personnel, sans Annette, saluted their new CO. "And lose the salutes. Dismissed; we're leaving in four hours, so say your goodbyes to whoever you wish."

* * *

The _Ra Cailum_ left Earth's orbit as it returned to Mars, where it rejoined with the UNSC vessels, plus their new alien ships acquired from the temple ship. The _St. Elizabeth_ getting back into formation with the fleet.

"This is Captain Drake to _Ra Cailum_ ," The UNSC Captain said. "We ready to roll the dice again?"

"We are, Captain; I just hope we get a snake-eyes. Sonja?"

"Dilithium chamber is ready; imbalance is set. Wormhole drive is ready for flight." Ron sat back in his chair. "Riza, punch it. All hands, prepare for turbulence; wormhole kickin' in in five." Riza pushed the button, the massive Oddy moving forward at warp speed, the rest of the fleet following thanks to the expanded warp field.

"Wormhole effect in five seconds! All hands, brace!" The unstable wormhole formed, taking the entire fleet into another realm, leaving new allies behind.

And old enemies ahead.

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: WORMHOLE! Sorry, that was one of my favorite scenes in _TMP_. …Which is topped by every shot of the glorious _TMP_ refit _Enterprise_. So, who wants to take bets on our next stop?**

 **117Jorn: Could be Sci-Fi, Fantasy… list goes on. We need a proper hint though *something red and white passes by* Oh son of a- YOU!**

 **?: Shit, out of my way!**

 **117Jorn: *Fires Shotgun!* GET BACK HERE YOU ABOMINATION OF NATURE!**

 **Ron the True Fan: (Grabs popcorn) I'm going to ENJOY this. If you need ammo, yell!**

 **Ominous Voice: Resistance is Futile.**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Oh, great. THAT can't be good.**

 **Ron the True Fan: Borg catchphrase, ominous voice with what sounds like multiple voices—OH FUCK NO!**

 **Ja Ne!**


	13. Chapter 13

**Time/Date: ?**

 **Location: ?**

* * *

Mortar fire rained on the abomination once more, impacting with the force of a B-52H's full bomb load, combined with Type 88 anti-ship missiles and enough ordinance to destroy Tokyo twice over.

Yet it wouldn't DIE. The attacker had tried this a dozen times before, yet she didn't get anywhere. But she had long since lost all sense; she would keep trying until she got the result she wanted: that thing DEAD.

But Homura Akemi would never give up. Not for her sake.

She had lined up dozen upon dozens of RPG-7s, Javelin missiles, AT-4s and various other anti-tank/ship weapons which she fired off one by one at the massive entity above her. She detonated C4 charges which blasted apart towers in vain attempts to collapse them on top of it. However none of it worked, as it continued to fly, spewing out fire.

Homura growled, as she leaped on top of a tanker truck, using her powers to power it as the truck drove forward - glowing purple as she headed towards a bridge. However as she rammed the truck into it, causing a massive explosion, the creature hardly flinched. She landed on the water - as several Anti-Ship missile launcher rose up from beneath her. They launched out, as the missiles impacted against the Witch - sending it flying backwards into the city.

'This is getting ridiculous. WHY can't I kill this thing?! It may be an amalgamation of multiple witches, but it seems almost impossible to destroy. How can Madoka—' The ravenette shook her head. No, she would NOT think of her. She was NEVER an option. She saw what happened every time she contracted.

Kriemhild Gretchen would NOT come into being ever again. Not if she could help it.

However, while she was distracted and attack hit her in the head - sending her flying back through several buildings. She growled, as she attempted to get back up - only for her to wince as she looked at her right leg, pinned down under the rubble, blood steadily pooling around it.

' _Why…?_ ' She thought, even as she growled looking up at the Witch. ' _Why can't I beat her no matter how many times I do this?!_ '

She faintly noticed Madoka's presence, along with the hated Incubator. 'Why can she NEVER leave this alone? She needs to live a normal life, not get caught up in this AGAIN.'

"Homura!"

"She can't beat it, Madoka Kaname. Only you can. And I can give you what you need to end this. Make your wish!" Homura struggled to get up. To scream at her not to listen. But she couldn't do it.

The pink eyes of Homura's beloved hardened as she opened them. Homura's mask broke as she finally allowed her emotions to bubble to the surface, easily allowing Madoka to see that she did not want this to happen. The pinkette understood, in a way. But she had to do it.

But Kyubey would not win, and Homura knew it; she saw it in Madoka's eyes. She would find a loophole.

"I wish… for this to end! For Homura's fight to end once and for all, and for Puella Magi to find a happy ending!"

As the frilly outfit appeared on Madoka's body, rosewood bow in hand, Homura's hand went to her shield. Her mission had suffered another delay.

She spun it, reversing time once more.

* * *

 **Time/Date: May 11, 2013 (one month prior to above events)**

 **Location: Sol System, near Martian orbit**

* * *

A rip in space-time appeared over Mars, before moments later the _Ra Cailum_ appeared from the void between universes - soon joined by its UNSC allies, as well as its recently acquired Ethereal vessels flanking them.

"That is NEVER going to get any easier."

Retching was heard from Kim's post as she puked into a bag, making Sonja shake her head. "Nope." Ron sighed, looking to Riza. "Location?"

"Mars orbit, but I've got nothing from Utopia Planitia, or any subspace transmissions within the Sol System. We're in another universe that's not our own."

The captain banged his head against his headrest. "FUCK! Set a course for Earth; we might as well take in the view before we leave again."

Cassie nodded. "Right, beginning system scans," she said, before she paused. "…Odd."

"What?"

"Long-range scans are picking up Tachyon particles around Earth," she informed, tilting her head to the side. "Signs of… time travel?"

"Oh, great. Which idiot's been breaking the Temporal Prime Directive NOW?"

"Pot calling the kettle black, Other?"

"Oh, shut up, Sonja. Localize the signatures, please, Cass."

The AI looked up at the ceiling, a sign of her working on the problem. "You won't like it."

"I didn't before."

"It's in Japan."

The sour look on the three highest ranking senior staff members' faces was NOT something Cassie wanted to experience again. Luna looked like she wanted to shoot something, Takeshi equally as unhappy and Ron… was Ron.

"Take, Luna, transporter room 1. Get some civilian clothing ready for us and beam us to the source of those tachyon emissions. Whoever did this is going to pay."

"Understood, boss," Takeshi replied, his eyes glowing slightly as he worked to restrain his Psionics, which were flaring up with his feelings the way they were, as he and Luna left the bridge.

"Should we bring Jaden?"

"No; he's 6'8 out of the armor and sticks out like a sore thumb. This is on us." All three entered the turbolift, whose doors closed and sent them on their way.

"Whose bright idea was it to develop time travel, anyways? All it's done is cause nothing but trouble: Narendra III, the Nexus incident, the bullshit that was the Battle of Sector 001—"

"Our trip to Iconia?"

Ron glanced at his stepsister and snorted. "Yes. If Sela hadn't shot those Iconians, we wouldn't've lost Romulus and the war wouldn't've happened. Instead, the Iconians would've hid themselves away forever."

"You don't know that, Ron."

"Then what do you think would've happened?"

Cassie just shrugged. "Who knows?" she said. "Could've been peaceful, or they could've turned out to be just as evil without Sela - just would take longer. Fact is what happened happened - nothing we can do to change it now."

"That's what time travel's for." The lift stopped, allowing them to exit and head to the transporter room.

* * *

Showers of light deposited the three in a dark area of a Japanese mall, not used by anyone but the staff. Luna and Takeshi pulled out a type-2 phaser each as Ron scanned the area with a tricorder. "A shitton of tachyons in this area. It's like someone's accelerating themselves to the point where it seems like time just stops. I've seen something like that before, I just can't remember for the life of me where."

"Huh," Takeshi remarked. "Well, let's take a look, see what we can find."

The tricorder beeped as it registered something new. "Two lifesigns. Human, both female, heading this way." The sound of shoes hitting the ground was heard in the distance as Ron set the tricorder to active scan, closing the device and putting it into his coat pocket, data feeding to his right eye's HUD before two girls rounded a corner.

"Madoka, seriously, let's go back to the… mall…" The girls were roughly 14, one with bright blue hair and the other pink, bobcut and twintails respectively, wearing identical uniforms. Schoolgirls, though they noticed the pink-haired one was carrying some kind of animal in her arms.

"Hello, young ladies. Is there something we can help you with?"

"Oh good! Look, you gotta help us!" the blue haired one said. "I think we're being chased by some crazy student! She tried to kill this animal when-"

Suddenly there was a sound of mad giggling which surrounded them, putting them on alert before their surroundings… images and places surrounding them, almost as if the environment was made out of the cover for a trapper keeper. And then… _they_ showed up, butterflies which had… cotton balls on their heads, with moustaches…

"…what… the… fuck?" Takeshi, Luna, and Ron all said at once.

Ron looked around. "I know this shit. Not this EXACTLY, but I know what this shit is." He glanced to his officers. "Set your phasers to setting 8, high EM band. This is the work of Species 19." Ron quickly fired his cricket at one of the familiars, vaporizing it. "And don't let them touch you! Trust me on this!"

"Understood!" Takeshi replied, making the adjustments before opening fire, Luna following suit.

Both girls watched as the three systematically slaughtered the creatures, Ron pulling out his compression rifle to fire on the largest thing in there, firing the powerful weapon in long narrow beams as it screamed. "I don't give two shits about your rose garden! SHUT UP!"

"You can understand that thing?!"

"Much to my everlasting regret, YES! I HATE THE BORG!"

A massive bang was heard before the rose creature exploded, dying before the area began to revert to normal.

Takeshi glanced off to the side, noticing a blonde girl the same age as the first two, dressed in yellow and white. "OK, didn't see her before," he said. "Though she seems to be carrying a musket of some kind."

"She's a victim."

She looked at the three. "I… I thought adults couldn't—"

"Normally they can't, but a carefully modulated subspace field can allow anyone to see these monstrosities." A click was heard, and Ron glanced over his shoulder, seeing a ravenette in a uniform similar to Madoka's, only purple and black replacing the yellow, holding a MK XIX Desert Eagle in her right hand, hammer cocked back and ready to fire.

While he questioned how a little girl could handle the recoil of a .50 Action Express weapon, he liked the fact that she had something against the Incubator.

"Hello. I see we share something."

Suddenly a transporter beam appeared between them, and appearing from it was none other than Jaden Takeo in full MJOLNIR, rifle at the ready "Ron! We lost your signal for… a…" He began, before he spotted the small animal in Madoka's arms. "…don't tell me we're in the fucking Pokemon universe now, are we?"

"Don't think so," Takeshi replied. "Though Ron's got more info than we do - I think the Borg might have run into an alternate of what's going on here."

Ron grabbed the little thing, narrowing his eyes. He knew this thing. "Hello, Kyubey."

The thing's unblinking eyes turned to face the captain's face. "You should not be able to see me."

"Species 19. Incubator. Highly psionic, hive minded. Emotionally repressed, but able to use the emotions of others as an energy source, normally using a medium."

The creature began to struggle. "No. No, you cannot be here yet!"

"But I am. Slapa, beam this thing into space. Preferably into low orbit; I want it to suffer before it dies. It's the least I can do to avenge the girls this bastard's destroyed."

"Really?" Jaden asked, poking the small animal. "Looks like it could barely harm a fly… hell, it looks like one of those plushies Larcei keeps collecting… "

Ron looked at Jaden. "You're climbing the ladder."

The Spartan looked at the two officers closest to Ron. "He likes you. Don't question it."

Ron extended his injection tubules, injecting the being with Borg nanoprobes as it psionically screamed before falling limp. "I killed its' higher brain functions: no psionics. Although it's PERFECTLY aware." He tossed it to Jaden. "Tell Larcei I got it on the ground; she'll believe you."

Jaden blinked, looking at the creature before looking back at Ron and the others… before sighing. "I'm getting too old for this shit…" he muttered. "And I'm only 21… _Ra Calium_ , all's good - one to beam back." And moments later, Jaden vanished in a flash of light.

"Okay, STOP!" Sayaka shouted, waving her hands. "What the HELL is going on here?! Who are you?! What were those things, why did _she_ try to kill that thing, who's the blonde girl, and WHY DID A SPARTAN BEAM OUT LIKE FROM FREAKING STAR TREK!?"

"Another one where we're fictional. Lovely."

Sayaka's jaw hit the ground. "…What."

"We're Starfleet officers. Captain Ronald Pinkerton, CO, USS _Ra Cailum_." He gestured to Luna and Takeshi. "My stepsister, Lunamaria Yamato and her husband, Takeshi."

"That… That's not possible."

"Well, all things are fiction, all things are reality. And to prove my point… screw the Prime Directive." The group disappeared in a transporter beam before anyone could object.

* * *

"I LOVE IT!" Larcei squealed as she hugged the 'Plushie' doll with all her might. "It's so cute! It's like a cat fox or something! Is it like… some kind of new Pokemon?"

Jaden chuckled slightly, shrugging. "I don't know, certainly looks like one." He said.

"Well, until we find out, I'm going to have a lot of fun with it!" she told him, hugging the 'Plushie' tightly.

Jaden had no intention of stopping her.

* * *

"What are the chances we'd run into a universe where something in our universe exists, but where we're also fictional?"

"Pretty low, I have to admit… though it does make me wonder what else is in this universe." Luna pulled up the files on Species 19 from Ron's personal database, which Takeshi noticed.

And began to mildly freak out about.

"Wait, that's Ron's database. Shouldn't you be NOT accessing that?"

"Eh, he won't give a damn. He reads from our personal databases all the time."

"Wait, what?" Takeshi asked.

"What, didn't you know? It's one of the reasons he was considered a complete dick at the Academy. He introduced a cron virus into the commandant's files."

"That explains why Ron was running away from Commandant Germain in the last year of the Academy that day," Takeshi remarked, before pausing. "Wait… I've been writing letters to Ryoko on my personal database ever since she got onto the Council, and tend to keep them for a few days to make sure I have everything I want to say written down. Does that mean…"

"He's been reading them? Probably. But you know him; never says anything about it until he decides to ruin your day. And he's probably waiting for the right day to ruin."

Ron WAS that kind of asshole. He once did that to Admiral Jellico. The man was trying to kill the ex-drone for days afterward.

So if that meant Ron was reading his letters…

Takeshi seethed. "Oh, that tears it," he muttered. "Next sparring match, I am **_SO_** thrashing his cybernetic ass!"

"If you can."

"Oh, I can." Takeshi knew he couldn't kill Ron (while he was an asshole, he was their asshole, and explaining to Starfleet why ron was dead was something Takeshi wasn't looking forward to. That and Takeshi wanted Larcei to have a father in her life) but beating the crap out of him?

THAT he could do.

* * *

"Species 19 was one of the first races the Borg ever encountered." Ron began the explanation for the four girls now in the ready room. "They use the most emotionally vulnerable of a species to generate massive amounts of energy: in humanity's case, young girls ranging in age from age 6 to age 18. They can do it to others, but they… lie about it. " The girls sat at the conference table, Homura forced to wear an anti-tachyon emitter. After finding out how she was able to do it, and that she was the source, Ron took the appropriate countermeasures.

She activated her powers, Homura would destroy herself.

Mami shook her head. "Kyubey has never lied to me."

"He's been lying to you since day one. They prey on the emotionally vulnerable. They shape you, mold you into their tools. In the end, you become your own prey: Puella Magi turn into the creatures you call witches. The Borg harnessed this power, and made it much more efficient: they don't need to use the cycle; just the memories of those they assimilated. You're not a brave warrior, Tomoe-san: you're a battery in the making. Thankfully, I can partially reverse the process; you won't be liches anymore."

"But… he…" Mami tried to reason, "We've… I've been doing this… since…"

Ron simply stared at her. While cruel, it was the truth. And Homura liked the man for simply giving it to them straight. "How do you know of them, Captain?" The Ravenette asked.

"I was assimilated by the Borg almost ten years ago and was given… modifications by them that could not be removed," he informed. "They used me as a stick of RAM for lack of a better term."

"What about the witches? There must be something—"

"I can't help those that are already turned; death is the only way to release them from their pain, and we're picking up more subspace disturbances, meaning an amalgamation is on the way, and if our readings are right, it's powerful enough to destroy most of Mitakihara before it supercharges itself into destroying more of Japan. Double your money; you're a millionaire in a month. It'll destroy Earth."

The door to the ready room chimed before Ron allowed Sonja and Cassie's hologram to enter his ready room. "Repairs to the drive are proceeding as predicted, boss: we'll be able to warp out in a few days."

"Good. Cass?"

"Long range sensor probes are picking up something at long range. I'm going to need your help to clean up the mess, though: I can't accurately ID it."

The captain smiled. "I'll join you in a few minutes. Tomoe-san, Miss Homura, please go to sickbay: I've already informed my doctor the information she needs to put your neural energy where it belongs."

Mami still looked rather shell-shocked, but nodded as she stood up, along with Homura as they were escorted to sick bay by Cassie's hologram. Leaving Ron with Madoka and Sayaka.

"That leaves me with you two. Obviously, I can't let you go back down there knowing what you know now about my ship. You identified our universe by name, so you know about the Prime Directive."

Sayaka nervously chuckled. "Uh… I just remember the beaming thing."

"Well, in a nutshell, you're not ready for the shit we'd expose you to," he explained. "But I can't allow you to forget about the Incubators, either; there's nine of them down there, three of them being in Japan."

Madoka blinked. "How do you know that, Pinkerton-taicho?"

Ron chuckled at the innocent question. "I have a subspace transmitter in my spine." He said, pointing to the back of his neck. "All we did was modify the sensors to pick up—" Voices began to enter the back of his mind, which he quickly shook off. He often got feedback from the transceiver. "Sorry, technical difficulties. We modified the sensors to scan for them, and my brain's connected to the computer. Simple."

Both girls looked at each other before looking back Ron in fear. "We're never going to leave, are we?"

Ron rose his hand. "If you can promise me you'll never speak of this again, you'll be free to leave." He assured, "But know that if you lie…" His smile faded. "I will know."

Sayaka shrugged "Even if we did, people would just think we're crazy," She informed. "Seriously: Magical Girls? Star Trek? _Halo_?"

"I said it before to someone else, Miki-san: all things are fictional… and all things are reality."

* * *

Jaden walked out of the turbolift, wanting to talk with the master of the insanity he had been forced into.

He had been joined by his fellow Spartans, who wanted to talk with Ron as well. They had felt they should talk with the man as well, although they stayed away from Jaden as much as possible.

He didn't know what to think about that, really. On the one hand, it was good that they were giving him space, but on the other, he wondered if they were worried about him, or rather his reputation. Of course, he had to halt that train of thought before he could sink into the spiral of depression that thinking about his dead teammates always started.

The doors to his ready room opened, and out came Ron and their two guests. "Spartan."

"Captain." All four spartans said at once, before they looked at one another, blinking in confusion.

"Seriously?"

"Well, we don't have last names." Jaden shrugged "Just numbers."

The Starfleet officer blanched. "NO. FUCK NO." The Captain shouted, "You people are going to get surnames before I deal with any of your bullshit."

"Huh?"

Sonja leaned back to answer the question. "He used to be a Borg drone."

"We knew THAT, Commander."

"Did you know that they remove names and simply give designations to ID a drone?" Sonja said, "He's getting BAD memories thanks to you idiots."

They stood there as they thought about that. "Well, at least we still have our first names," Rosenda A-344 remarked.

"Which doesn't make it any easier. Using your first names isn't easy; surnames are easier to remember. I'm not sure but it took a few weeks for Ron to remember his own name."

"It took four hours, and I was trying to kill everyone on board Rutia's ship before they finally got me down, thank you very much."

"You're welcome, boss."

"I will MURDER YOU!"

Sonja simply kept smiling in face of Ron's threats.

"This crew is SERIOUSLY fucked up."

"We were all capable of serving on the _Enterprise_ in terms of skillsets, but our personalities meant we never got the cut." Riza looked back before yelling, "Rejects forever!"

"...You're all fucking INSANE."

"Oh, it took you this long to notice?"

Jaden shook his head. "No, we noticed. We just couldn't CONFIRM it until now. You're all crazy. How you people joined your military is beyond me."

Ron scoffed. "PLEASE. We're not really military. We're as military as the freaking US Coast Guard was. We're explorers. Whenever people aren't trying to kill us."

"Which is VERY often on this ship."

"…I'm not gonna ask."

* * *

Rutia scanned the two and their 'soul gems'. They resembled katric arks, in a way, and she would be able to fix them the same way as transferring a katra back into its' own body.

The Fal-tor-pan, however, was out of the question; there was no one on board that knew how the ceremonial procedure was supposed to work. So she would use the same method a criminal used to hijack Julian Bashir's body in 2370. Combined with a LOT of Borg know-how that she, understandably, trusted as far as she could throw it.

It was Borg knowledge; that was all that really needed to be said.

"Is this all… really necessary?" Mami asked. "I mean, I know all this tech is advanced, but…"

"Trust the Captain. He knows what he's talking about, though really, I'm going to keep you both here for long-term observation because while I trust Ron, I don't trust his sources." Rutia began scanning Mami, confirming that her brain patterns were barely registering. "Alright, sit still." She attached a lead to her gem before placing another one onto one of Mami's temples, connected by a cord. "This will hurt a little." The words were an understatement as Mami was screaming in seconds. "Whoops. I keep forgetting that human brains are… sensitive to electrical shock."

The elder Puella Magi fell unconscious on the biobed, groaning. "You're next, Miss Akemi."

"Nononononononono!" Homura shook her head, the usually stoic woman taking several steps away from Rutia. "I'm not letting you do _that_ to me!"

"You say that like you have a choice." Homura paled in fear. She had faced witches and Walpurgisnacht for decades. Endured suffering like no one could imagine.

But Rutia Yulanra scared her more then anything in existence. And with the armband, she couldn't use her shield to flee. " _Bridge to sickbay: doc, bring your patients to the bridge; we may have a problem._ "

"Captain, I'm needed down here to make sure the process—"

" _NOW, Doctor; I've got more experience with Puella Magi then you do, and I'll tell you now that she's perfectly fine._ "

Rutia looked at Mami's unconscious body, who looked like she was having a nightmare.

Considering what happened, and what her captain told the young lady, that was natural. "Sir, I just used a neuroelectrical device based on Borg technology to transfer her mind back where it belongs. Forgive me if I don't exactly take it at your word."

" _And forgive ME, doctor, when I say the Borg had PLENTY of experience in dealing with Incubators and their victims. She'll be groggy for a few days as her brain wires itself back together, but she'll be fine afterwards._ "

Rutia wished she could say she didn't feel comforted by Ron's nonchalance of Mami's situation, but she did the same thing so many times, it was not funny. "Fine, we'll be there momentarily." She sighed, tapping the badge before looking at Homura. "Seems you lucked out, Homura-san… for now."

The young girl let out a sigh of relief.

That relief was short-lived as Rutia grabbed her hand and dragged her out of sickbay.

* * *

"Well?" Both women didn't even look as Ron, Madoka, and Sayaka joined them at one of the science stations. "We launched out a stealth probe a few hours ago, just after we arrived, and we've been picking up limited subspace interference; static, for lack of a better term. We just cleaned it up and…we're not sure if the images the probe's sending back are accurate or not."

Madoka got her head into position to look at the readings, but it was all Greek to her. "Sayaka?"

"Hey, just because I know a bit about Star Trek doesn't make me a Trekkie." The schoolgirl said, raising her hands in defense.

The three officers looked at the two girls, who clammed up immediately. "Put the footage up on the big screen. Let's get a better look at it."

"One moment…" Cassie muttered, "Coming into view n-" She paused, before her eyes widened. "…oh fuck…"

"What is-" Ron began, but didn't finish before the main view screen of the bridge shifted, revealing space… and a large, metallic cube steadily moving forward.

(BGM: Borg Engaged - Star Trek The Next Generation: Best of Both Worlds)

"Oh, fuckery, indeed." Sayaka stared at the cube as Madoka blinked in confusion before Rutia and Homura arrived on the bridge. "What… is that?"

"Ladies… that's a Borg cube. A Borg cube here. We're doomed. If the amalgamation doesn't destroy Earth… they will."

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: Mado, Mado, Mado, you should know that making wishes is a BAD idea by now…You just might kill everyone you love by accident.**

 **117Jorn: Prepare for Assimilation**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Well, to use a TV Tropes term I find myself using a lot, This Is Gonna Suck.**

 **Ron the True Fan: MASSIVE understatement. Because these aren't the Borg we know. They're… different. More _evil_.**

 **117Jorn: Why might that be you may ask? Find out NEXT TIME!**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**

 **(Omake 1)**

A transporter beam light signalled the arrival of Jaden, as he appeared with his rifle drawn. "Captain! What's going on? We lost your signal-" He began, before he spotted the Kyubey in Madoka's hands. "…no one… move…"

Ron blinked "What are you-"

*BONK*

"OW!" Kyubey cursed, rubbing its head after having a Pokeball thrown at it. "I'M NOT A GODDAMNED POKEMON!"

Jaden blinked, before groaning as he put his Ash Ketchum hat away "Damnit… worth a shot."


	14. Chapter 14

**Time/Date: 2013 AD**

 **Location: Earth**

* * *

"Okay… someone explain to me how the hell the BORG got here?" Colonel Kelly asked, pointing at the screen where the Borg Cube was displayed. "I'm pretty sure these fuckers are suppose to be stuck over at the Delta Quadrant by now!"

"IDIC's a bitch," Ron informed. "And I blame the Incubators; the Borg drove them to near-extinction in our universe, but they never left the Delta Quadrant. Here, they came to Earth. And these aren't the Borg we're used to. They're worse." Ron closed his eyes, focusing on the voices of the Collective. "Undine. Krenim. Vaadwaur. Devore. Teuterian."

Sonja nervously chuckled. "Oh, fuckie do."

"What? What's so bad about them?"

"Ms. Miki, the Undine are Species 8472, and are almost impossible to assimilate," Sonja said. "The fact that he can hear them in the collective is a very bad thing. Still doesn't answer the how, boss."

Homura flinched, knowing the reason. Madoka's final wish.

She altered the fabric of reality; introduced the Borg into this universe and made them the ultimate destroyer. Accidentally, of course. It was clear the captain was on a similar train of thought. "When an incubator contracts, the amount of potential energy varies. It can be as powerful as a small starship's warp core or almost at the level of Q. This is pretty close to the latter. What I don't get is how that cube hasn't detected the probe yet."

Sonja snapped her fingers. "Multi-adaptive shielding," she said. "I put a modified version of that shit on each of our stealths; sure, it's no cloak, but it'll do."

"The Borg assimilated that technology."

"OUR Borg. But these aren't our Borg; they're… some sort of random mutation, with the same level of technology the Collective was at when the Enterprise-D ran into them at J25, but they don't have the technology developed by the Hansens."

Were this an anime, Madoka and Sayaka would be having swirls in their eyes from all the technobabble. Homura, at least, had some idea of what they were talking about.

"Get that probe back here, and expedite repairs to the drive. As soon as we're done, we're leaving. There's nothing we can do."

"B-But the people on earth!" Madoka shouted out, "W-We can't just leave them! My-My family and friends are down there!"

"There's nothing we can do. One starship, even an _Odyssey_ -Class superdreadnought, can't tangle with the Borg Collective alone. Our allies don't have the firepower to hang in a firefight with them, either. And I can't evacuate seven billion people off of Earth. At most, I can pack one hundred and fifty thousand into this ship. It would not be pleasant, and where would we take you? The Vulcans wouldn't tolerate the Borg, or anyone else, violating their space, and yet here's a cube, heading for Earth." Madoka shrank under the Captain's cold logic. He was right. "So what would you suggest we do, Miss Kaname?"

"Save as many as we can." All eyes turned to Jaden as he stepped onto the bridge. "UNSC would do something similar… when ONI thinks the Covenant are about to invade a planet, they quietly evacuate as many people as they can. Prioritizing top scientists, engineers, leaders, and even family members of critical ONI and UNSC staff… it's better than standing around and doing nothing to help them."

Ron groaned. "I hate no-win scenarios," he muttered. "Can we bump up the count a little, Sonja?"

The hispanic woman shrugged. "We've got parts to build two _Sabers_." She said, "Won't be much; at most, that's a thousand people shoved into each ship, and conditions would suck, to say the least."

"Better than nothing." The Captain nodded "Transfer the parts to the _St. Elizabeth_ and get them built as quickly as possible. In the meantime, I want every ship under the cloak. And I have a grim job to do."

Homura said it for him, preventing anyone from asking. "You are going to choose who lives. And who dies," she confirmed. "A choice I do not wish on you, Captain. I ask only that you put Madoka on that list."

"What, you think I would waste your efforts trying to save her?" Ron asked. "You went through thousands of loops to save Madoka here; I'm not wasting that." Ron sighed. "I'll be in my ready room; please inform Miss Tomoe of the events once she gets up."

"Understood," Takeshi replied, his eyes glowing briefly. "But I recommend extreme care is taken with her, Boss - what I can get from just the barest contact with her mind tells me she's got a rather fragile personality."

"She's been screwed over by an Incubator for at least a year; I'm not surprised."

* * *

Mami groaned as she awoke, rubbing her head. The last thing she remembered was something involving Star Trek followed by blinding pain.

Then she remembered everything. It started out simple enough, just another day hunting witches before Kyubey went missing - being attacked by Homura no less. But upon arriving at another site where a Witch was spotted… she met Madoka, and the… _Star Trek_ people… who proceeded to tell her everything she knew about being a Puella Magi was a complete lie.

She was a battery. A power source for Kyubey. A witch in the making. Whatever that crazy doctor did meant little to her; she was a dead girl walking. A zombie, or 'lich', whatever that was.

The doors to sickbay opened, allowing Rutia and Madoka to enter. "Hello, Mami. Feeling better?"

"I have a headache…what did you do to me?" The doctor gestured to Mami's hairpin, which no longer glowing. "I put your mind back where it belongs. No more 50 meter range limit and you drop, according to the boss. But there's… another problem."

"So long as I can keep fighting Witches, it's fine." Mami said, standing back on her feet. "I need to get back down there… I still have things to do."

"Tomoe, there's something you need to kn—"

"The only thing I need to know, doctor, is where is that… beaming device! I want to leave! NOW!"

Madoka recoiled at the kind, patient girl's angry retort. Rutia impassively didn't react. "Computer, display a route to the closest transporter room. If you want to die so badly, Miss Tomoe, go right ahead. We gave you a choice. Clearly, you prefer suicide." She stepped aside, allowing Mami to storm past.

Madoka watched in horror. "Why… why didn't you stop her?"

"She didn't want to hear it. Nothing I can do about it if she wants to kill herself. Besides, I have to get ready to deal with a LOT of refugees." The Trill glanced at Madoka and gave her a smile. "Mind giving me a hand?"

Madoka glanced back at where Mami headed, before looking back at Rutia before she sighed. "I-I guess," she said. "How can I help?"

"Just grab what I ask you to get. I'm going to be doing a LOT of work in the next week."

* * *

The best and brightest. That was all he could save.

While saving seven billion people was impossible, Ron could focus on the best humanity of this era had to offer: scientists, poets, those who had done something to merit themselves in history.

Other than them and a few other 'lucky' survivors, everyone else was going to die. Or rather, it was a fate worse than death. Assimilation by the Borg was a fate no being deserved. He would rather see humanity rendered extinct first. " _Captain, this is the transporter room: our guest is requesting permission to beam down_."

Ron looked up from his PADD. "Which one?"

" _A Mami Tomoe, sir_."

He wanted to slam his head into his desk. The girl was being given a real second chance. Did she want to die THAT badly? "Granted, but I want a Code 48-J. Clear?"

"Yes sir," Cassie nodded - a Code 48-J basically meant that when Mami was beamed down, a small transmitter was going to be beamed inside her body when energized. It would allow them to keep an eye on her movements, as well as bio readings. "She's energizing… "

"Keep a lock on her. As soon as we lose signal, tell me. I'll deal with it myself." That left the final one. The other victims of the Incubators, Mami's contemporary Puella Magi. They, more than anyone, deserved a second chance.

"Send Homura Akemi to my ready room; I have a job for her, if she's willing to take it."

* * *

"I… know this is… a lot to take in, Professor… but it is the truth." The Starfleet Officer informed, though silently not trying to geek out considering just who he was talking too.

To anyone who had not known earth history, or the people of earth, this may have seemed like a regular, ordinary man, stuck on an advance wheelchair, looking like an aged old man. But to anyone who studied Starfleet's historical records, they would know exactly who this man was, and would be having just as much trouble trying to speak to him in person - and not as a Hologram.

"You. have. made. your. Point." The man spoke - but not with his natural voice, but rather with a synthesized computer voice. "This. is. still. difficult. to. fully. comprehend."

"We know." The officer nodded. "It's difficult to deal with, but we don't exactly have a lot of time. My captain wants to transport as many people off of Earth before the Borg arrive. You were pretty much top of the list, seeing as you were one of the greatest minds of your age. Imagine what you could do with the _Ra Cailum's_ science labs."

The man in question was the legendary Stephen Hawking. Much of his theoretical works made their way into working technologies in the 24th and 25th Centuries, and his work eventually led to Cochrane's launch of the _Phoenix_ and the birth of the Federation 80 years later.

"What. about. my. family?"

"They were prioritized as well," the officer nodded. "Along with thousands of other individuals. We will save as many people as we can, I promise."

The legendary scientist seemed to pause in thought for a solid minute, thinking of his options. "Very. well." He informed. "I. will. Join. you. Just. make. Sure. my. Family. Is. safe. "

"Done." He handed a transponder to Mr. Hawking. "Whenever you're ready, sir, we can transport up to the Ra Cailum: Commander Henderson's been eager to meet you."

"Very. well." Stephen said. "Well. Beam. me. Up. Scotty."

The pair disappeared in a shower of light, reappearing on a transporter pad on board the _Odyssey_ -Class starship. Waiting for them were Mitod and Sonja, the latter of whom was grinning. "Professor Hawking," she said. "Commander Sonja Henderson, chief engineering officer. It's an honor to actually meet you in person."

"The. pleasure. Is. mine. My. apologies. For. not. Shaking. Your. hand."

Sonja waved it off. "We know about your amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Professor; we completely understand, and it's not your fault. Would you like a tour of the ship?"

"Of. course." The professor said, moving his wheelchair forward to follow the engineer. "It. is. Similar. To. what. I. have. Seen. when. I. was. On. the. Set. for The. Next. Generation."

"…Wasn't that the set for the show involving the _Enterprise_ -D?"

"Yes."

"Well, this is an _Odyssey_ -Class ship. We're the _Enterprise_ -F's big sister!"

"Really?"

Sonja nodded. "She was commissioned about three weeks before the Big E. So it counts! I also designed her at Utopia Planitia." While Sonja (and many others) geeked out, more away teams were sent to the surface.

In short, the duty sucked.

* * *

Kyoko Sakura didn't want to believe the _Star Trek_ shit. She was the daughter of a preacher; she didn't watch TV much. But seeing Homura shoot a familiar with a phaser (provided by Ron) was enough to make her listen up.

"Okay… so…" she started, taking the sucker out of her mouth. " _Star Trek_ is real… that Kyubey was using us as batteries, we transform into witches, and now the Borg are coming to essentially fuck the entire world up via assimilation. Do I got that about right?"

"More or less. Captain Pinkerton would explain it better, and he's willing to take all of the Puella Magi with them." That included Oriko.

Homura wasn't a fan of her. Killing Madoka would do that. But the Puella Magi were on the list, and while the captain of the ship was an asshole, he was nice when he chose to be.

"So… they got pocky on board?"

Homura said nothing, pinning a combadge to Kyoko's hoodie before she was beamed up kicking and screaming.

* * *

The cube continued its' approach, cruising into the system at one-eighth impulse. Jaden glared at the cube displayed on the screen in front of him, wondering how a big metal box could be the greatest threat the Federation had ever faced.

"Kinda bland, isn't it?"

Jaden turned his chair around to face Lunamaria, who was wearing a customized version of MACO armor. "It's just a bunch of metal plates fixed in the shape of a cube. How could it POSSIBLY be dangerous?"

"Oh, believe me, that thing is massive," Luna remarked. "As for how dangerous it is… Computer, play recording, Wolf 359."

The probe image was replaced by footage of starships firing on another cube. Jaden had time to memorize some starship designs, and saw as an _Excelsior_ -Class starship's saucer was destroyed by the cube, then brushed aside as it targeted the _Miranda_ -Class USS _Saratoga_ , causing crippling and mortal damage. The USS _Ahwahnee_ fired on the cube with a salvo of photon torpedoes, which did nothing to stop it before the ship was fired on and torn open.

"Uh… fuck."

"And that was over 45 years ago," Luna remarked. "We've made advances in technology since then, but…" She shrugged. "Computer, play recording, Vega Colony Incident."

A large craft landed on the ground, impaling it with a large metal spike before drones beamed onto the ground, attacking civilians, stunning them and injecting them with those tubules he'd seen Ron use a million times.

And Jaden thought REACH was bad. This was worse.

One image showed something that looked familiar. The eye was replaced by a cybernetic one, and he was bald, covered in some kind of body armor. But he'd recognize Ron anywhere.

"Yeah, Vega was where we found and recovered Ron," Luna admitted. "We were able to liberate him from the Collective, but… well, back around Wolf 359 when the _Enterprise_ rescued Captain Picard, who had also been assimilated, the only thing that couldn't be removed from him were traumatic memories. Obviously, the Borg have adapted since then."

Ron had mentioned his… augmentations a few times. Jaden thought he was bragging. Now he knew better.

He was just a victim that was taking advantage of what was forced on him. "They can't be removed, can they?"

"The implants? Most of his organs were outright _replaced_. He's lucky he survived being taken out of the collective to begin with. It took a couple of weeks to figure out most of them, and adapt them to work without the Borg hive mind. I think if anyone gave him the chance to be normal again, though, he wouldn't go for it."

"I understand… well, kinda." Jaden said, looking at his arms where faint scars could still be seen. "I'd never want to get rid of my augments… they've become a part of me, who I am… reminds me of why I'm doing all of this."

"It's sorta the same with Ron," Luna admitted. "His implants are reminders of what the Borg did to him, and what they want to do to all sentient life."

One of the science stations began going haywire. "We just lost contact with a subspace transponder. The probe's still active, so—"

The door to Ron's ready room opened as the man himself ran to the bridge transporter pad. "Lock onto the last known coordinates of that transponder and beam me down there! Dumb girl wants to die, she's dying on MY terms!"

"You need backup?" Jaden asked, picking up his rifle. "I'm ready."

"Oh, fuck it; get over here!" He grabbed his compression rifle and two type-2 phasers, holstering one and tossing the other to Jaden as he approached. "You'll need it. Bullets are nice, particle weapons are better against these things."

"Fair enough," He nodded stepping onto the transporter "Remind me to ask Sonja to make me an MA5 that can swap between projectiles and phasers."

"Energize!" Both disappeared seconds later. "Who wants to bet that the Boss is going to be screwed at the end of this?"

"Shut up, Corpie."

* * *

Jaden did not know what to expect. More Incubators, to be sure, but he wasn't prepared for… this. "…Why does it look like a bunch of candy?"

"Most final stage victims form a barrier based on what what their greatest desire was. In this case… a little girl wanted to have some candy."

"This is fucking weird. Why aren't you freaked out by it?"

"Kathryn Janeway said it best: weird is part of the job. So, freaking out is… kinda pointless. To us, all this is just part of the job. We get…numb to it after a while." A phaser bolt vaporized a familiar before they continued onward. "Trust me. You'll get used to it."

Jaden groaned, firing his own phaser at a familiar. "For some reason, I doubt that…" he muttered.

"Let's go; we've got an idiot to save."

* * *

Mami fired both of her Brown Bess-styled muskets at the candy-familiars, killing as many as she could.

She figured her life was pointless; so she didn't bother thinking. Kyubey betrayed her; so why bother doing anything but what she was doing before?

If she was going to die, she would die doing something.

And she would; this witch was going to die.

She created her massive cannon and fired at the witch. The doll-like creature collapsed, and something akin to a massive worm with a clown's face and 'wings' emerged from out of the doll, with a sinister smile with razor-sharp teeth - and heading straight towards her.

Mami wanted to move, get out of the way - to keep fighting… but her legs refused to move, looking at the creature wide-eyed. Her previous courage dried up, replaced by nothing but complete and total fear. She was going to die… die alone… no family, no friends…

Her vision went black as the teeth prepared to take off her head, hitting something hard.

"You are a fucking IDIOT, Tomoe." Mami opened her eyes, finding a barrier of sorts holding Charlotte's mouth open. "If you want to commit suicide, you're doing it on MY terms!" She trembled as she looked to her right, seeing Ron holding a tricorder and Jaden moving in to shoot the witch with his rifle.

The stress of losing her parents, all of the things that happened in the past three days and this… it pushed her over the edge as she fell unconscious. "Jaden, keep shooting the damn thing; I'll grab her!"

"No problem," Jaden said, pulling out his knife while still firing away with the phaser rifle, beating back Charlotte as the abomination was forced back. The creature tried to reach out to bite him, but Jaden caught it by the mouth with his arms, and held the beast's mouth open with his Spartan strength "Peeeyou, guess you never heard of a TicTac?" He asked the Witch, before punching it in the face - leaping over the creature before running along its elongated neck/body.

Charlotte moved around, roaring as it tried to chase after Jaden - as the Spartan fired over his shoulder, keeping the Witch's attention on him - while Ron took care of Mami. "Come on ugly! You want breakfast? You'll have to catch it!"

The witch followed, roaring. It was mad, and that was what they needed. When something got mad, it lost focus. And when something lost focus, it just made it easier to kill.

And Jaden was very GOOD at killing things. All he had to do was have Ron distract it so he could finally kill it. A single narrow beam from Ron's type-2 was the distraction he needed as he threw an M9 grenade down its' throat, exploding and killing the witch as the labyrinth (or a subspace pocket, as Ron called it) faded away.

"Ha!" Jaden clapped his hands, "Eat shit ya overgrown Muppets reject!"

"Pinkerton to _Ra Cailum_ : beam us back! NOW!" Ron called out on his Commbadge, as he picked up Mami.

"She alright?" The spartan asked, dashing back towards them.

"She'll be ok physically, but mentally?" He shook his head. "I fucked her over badly." All three dematerialized and rematerialized on board the _Ra Cailum_ , in one of the transporter rooms closer to sickbay as a medical team entered the room. "Get her to sickbay. Use a level 4 subspace field; that'll knock out her abilities."

Mami's eyes fluttered open before she latched onto Ron, crying her eyes out. "D-daddy?"

Ron, Jaden and everyone else all blinked at the words that came out of her mouth "…eh?"

"DADDY!" Mami shouted, hugging Ron in a tight embrace - tears streaming down her face "You're alive! I-I don't believe it y-you're alive! T-the car crash and… and mom and…"

Everyone stared at Ron, who glared at them to shut them up. The only one who didn't fear the glare was Jaden.

And in his case, he hadn't been around Ron long enough to learn how to fear them. "She's your kid?" The Spartan asked, with a slightly amused smirk.

"Shut up." He forced Mami's head to look into his eyes. "Honey, go with these people. They'll make sure you didn't suffer anything from the crash. Ok?" She simply gripped tighter to his body. "Great. I'll take her down. AND STOP GRINNING!"

* * *

Rutia chuckled as Ron tried to pry Mami off of him. "I ran a genetic comparison between the boss and our little girl. She's his kid, but at the same time, not."

At first Jaden didn't get it, before he let it process in his head. "Let me guess," he said. "Mami's father was actually Ron from _this_ universe? Or something to that effect?"

"Yup." She said, struggling with a chuckle "It's hilarious. He's a 41 year old virgin and he's a father!" The Trill began laughing before falling on the ground, forcing Jaden to deal with Ron, who was patting Mami's back in order to get her to stop crying.

And let go of him; he had better things to do. Thankfully he _was_ able to get the girl to fall asleep after a few minutes. "PLEASE tell me you've got good news."

"Well, depends how you look at it." Jaden informed, leaning against the wall. "Turns out… genetically speaking, you _are_ her father - this universe's version of you was her father at least, so… yeah."

Ron groaned loudly. "If IDIC weren't actual fact, I would SHOOT something."

"IDIC?"

"Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations." He explained. "In short, anything's possible. For example, there's a universe where the Covenant laid down their arms and proclaimed humanity their new alien overlords."

Jaden's disbelieving expression gave the Captain a brief laugh. "Yeah, it's possible. Well. I guess I have to move out of my quarters. A closet's no place for a family of two."

"A Closet?"

"Yes." Both glanced to the door, seeing an amused Luna leaning on the door. "He literally lives in the smallest room on the ship. As an ex-Borg drone, he REALLY didn't need much room."

Jaden shook his head, before looking at the resting Mami "…you know, now I kinda see the resemblance… " He admitted, "Can't believe I didn't see it earlier… she acts like you, too, in a sense."

"Don't start. There a reason you came down here, Luna, besides to make my day worse?"

"You know me too well, big brother. We DO have a problem. With the added people, our life support demands have skyrocketed. We can't keep the cloak active for another day. If we do, we're going to lose power to life support."

"I am not liking this choice. If we decloak, the Borg will find us—"

"I know - but that's what we're going to have to do," Luna told him. "We'll just have to do our best, and hope it's enough."

"Fuckery. Give the order." Luna tapped her combadge. "All hands, stand to battle stations; red alert. We are decloaking. Repeat, we are decloaking. All security teams, report to stations."

Ron looked at Jaden. "We've got 9000 people on this ship, not counting my crew."

"I know; protect them with my life." He nodded. "I've done this dance long before I joined you guys."

* * *

Planet detected. Classification: standard oxygen-nitrogen. Lifeforms: 7 billion. Unknown species. Prepare to assimilate.

The Cube continued its' journey, heading for Earth as its' sensors picked up an anomaly.

Ten vessels detected in orbit. Status: technologically advanced. Unknown technologies. Opening channel and identifying.

* * *

Ron, Luna, and Jaden entered the bridge, Mami still hanging onto the captain. "Say anything, and you'll regret it. Report."

At that point, a pop sounded over the comm system, before a hybrid voice comprised of millions said a line that many of them recognized.

" _We are the Borg. Your technological and biological distinctiveness will be added to our own. Your culture will adapt to service us. Resistance is Futile._ "

Another pop was heard as the channel was cut.

"I hate it when they do that. It's always 'you will be assimilated', never 'hello, how ya doin?'."

Jaden blinked. "That was… a lot of voices."

"That's the Borg: a collection of minds bound to one will. And they're firing on us."

"Brace for impact!" The _Ra Cailum_ shuddered as the Borg Cube opened fire upon their ship. "Cassie!"

"Firing!" The A.I shouted, as the Dreadnought returned fire with its own phasers - varying the settings to ensure that the Borg couldn't adapt to their weapons.

"Cube is changing course: range, 350000 kilometers from Earth!"

"If they close to a tenth of that distance, they'll start beaming drones down to Earth. I need options!"

Sonja shook her head. "I… have an idea, sir."

"Spit it out!"

"We pull a Soran: use a trilithium warhead to cause a level-12 shockwave."

There was a deadly silence across the bridge - everyone knowing exactly what she was suggesting… save for one confused Spartan. "Uhh… explanation?" He asked.

Ron, as Mr. Nutshell, gave it to him. "Trilithium's a nuclear inhibitor. A man named Tolian Soran used it to destroy a star, and nearly used it on another the Viridian system. The incident resulted in the embarrassing loss of the _Enterprise_ -D. A class-12 shockwave will destroy everything in the system." Jaden's jaw dropped.

A Nova bomb could only shatter a moon or scar a planet. A covenant antimatter bomb had more explosive force, and he'd seen the Starfleet photon torpedoes in action: one torpedo destroyed a _CAS_ -class assault carrier which had full shields.

But destroying a _sun_ and causing a _supernova_?

"We'll have to knock out the cube's propulsion matrix to make sure it doesn't escape, plus the central plexus to make sure they don't transmit the data on our wormhole drive back to the Collective, boss."

"We can do the former." Ron said, "Jaden, take a team of ODSTs, Alpha Team and some of our MACOs over to the cube: they'll know what to hit. You've got 30 minutes."

"Thirty?"

"Ten for Sonja to make the warhead, fifteen for the weapon to reach the sun and five to give you a head start. MOVE!"

Jaden paused for a second, only a second before he cursed "Goddamnit!" He shouted, before running towards the transporter room. "Alpha Team, Red team, Blue team, get your asses suited up and in the Transporter!"

The ship rocked before alarms that Jaden had never heard went off. "Shields are down on decks one through seven!" Green light showers signalled the arrival of Borg drones, covered in skin-tight exo-plating. "Fuck." One looked directly at Ron, almost curiously before advancing at him.

"Not this time, you son of a bitch." A knife ended up in its' head, courtesy of Sonja, who pulled out her Calico M960 and opened fire. "Boss, behind you!" A drone extended its' arm before the captain spun around and punched it in the face, knocking it back.

This woke up Mami. And while she was still screwed in the head, she still had her powers.

"G-GET AWAY FROM MY DAD!" She shouted, summoning up one of her Musket rifles, before aiming at the Borg Drone, before pulling the trigger - as he .50 Caliber round shot out and blasted the Borg's head clean off.

"…Nice shot."

* * *

The interior of the cube was humid: 70% higher then on board the _Ra Cailum_ , two kilopascals higher and it was almost 40 degrees celsius. And, while strange, it was skeletal, almost… barren, like no ship Jaden had ever been on.

"Keep your heads on a swivel. The Borg will know we're here, and they'll make every attempt to assimilate or kill us. So don't bother aiming anywhere but the head."

"Zombie tactics," Jaden nodded, pulling out his own M45 Shotgun. "I can get behind that. Remember: We need to move fast, hit hard, and GTFO before the whole system goes Supernova."

"Are we _seriously_ doing this?" Blue Team's leader - Church asked, to which Jaden sighed - shaking his head.

"Better to blow Earth up then let everyone on the surface be enslaved by an alien race," he admitted. "Come on, no time for chit-chat. MACO, lead the way."

Two of the MACOs led the way, using MA37s instead of phaser rifles for something the UNSC forces found ironic.

The Borg had shields that, after a maximum of 12 shots, adapted to particle weapons, but not projectiles. As everyone used particle and plasma weapons, this made sense.

But it gave them an advantage to exploit. A trio of drones rounded a corner, and were cut down by 7.62mm bullets in seconds. "They know we're here. Move out!"

More red lasers signaled more Borg on the move, and Jaden was beginning to understand why fighting them on the ground was such a pain in the ass. From what he was told, there were at least three hundred thousand hostiles. And they were going to have to get through them, forcefields and enough plasma to destroy a planet to get to the plexus.

Oh, joy.

* * *

" _Saratoga_ and _Jericho_ , fire MACs at the following coordinates at my command!" The two UNSC light warships turned to engage the cube, who was mostly focusing on the Ra Cailum and its' escort, launched minutes earlier. "FIRE!" A volley of photon torpedoes and two MAC rounds impacted the cube, the antimatter doing more damage, but the railgun rounds hurt the cube as it began slowing down.

"Cube's propulsion matrix has taken heavy damage! FTL systems are offline!" Ron was less than pleased with how long this was taking, but the Borg had boarded his ship on no fewer than six decks, so it was understandable. "How long until that warhead's ready?!"

" _Almost done Boss!_ " Sonja replied on the comm, " _One more minute!_ "

The _Ra Cailum_ shook once more "Hurry it up!"

"Do you want to blow up the ship, boss?!"

"We can't hold that cube off forever! As soon as the warhead's installed, shove it into a torpedo tube and fire!" A console sparked, sending Corpsa to the deck. "I know we need EPS relays in the consoles, but WHY do they need to keep exploding?"

* * *

It was big, shaped like a cube and a royal pain in the ass to get to.

But at last, the team had reached the central plexus. "So, how do we knock this thing out? Computer virus? Worms?"

"Spatial charges. Best way to knock out anything Borg is to destroy it."

"Simple: I like it." Jaden nodded, before his motion tracker detected several red blips "Let's move fast - we've got company!"

(BGM: Captain Borg: Star Trek TNG Best of Both Worlds)

The borg drones approached from all four entrances to the central chamber, and were introduced to shotgun pellets, bullets and grenades as they entered. But Jaden was starting to see why the Starfleeters didn't bother reintroducing projectile weapons.

The dead were piling up, and the drones were still coming.

"Seriously, how many of these guys are in one of these things?!" Jaden asked, as he reloaded.

"A LOT," Lieutenant Ramirez said, as he placed a quartet of charges on the cube-shaped device, as well as a small present the Borg wouldn't be happy about. While it was different, Jaden knew a nuke when he saw one.

Kinda hard to miss. "Charges set: time to exfil! Back to the beam-in site!" One of the ODSTs - the lazy-as-hell Grif - fired his AR into another drone before asking the question on Jaden's mind. "Do we HAVE to? Can't we just beam out here?"

"Too much shielding around the plexus! We're pretty damn close to the center of the cube! Move out!"

"You heard the man!" Jaden shouted, firing his MA37 into the upper body of a Drone - shredding it to pieces. "Move it! We've got ten minutes before everything from Sol to Mars goes supernova!"

* * *

Screaming was heard over every radio frequency. Ron knew those screams.

He made them in 2401 when the Borg turned him into a mindless walking machine. "Time."

"T-minus fifteen minutes, sir. We're out of the cube's weapons range, and clear to fire the probe."

"Make one final pass over the cube so we can beam our people out of there, then order the fleet into formation. We're… we're leaving."

The _Odyssey_ -Class ship turned back towards the cube, firing the solar probe fit with the sun buster from the aft torpedo launcher before firing its' engines to make a pass over the cube.

"Captain, I've got the away team on sensors." Ron sat down in his chair, not looking forward to what was about to happen. "Beam them out of there as soon as we're in range, Chief!"

" _Stand by… energizing!_ " There was a short pause. " _All away team members accounted for sir!_ "

"All ships, enter formation; Takeshi, get your ass docked! Prepare for wormhole insertion!"

* * *

Damage to systems: heavy. Central Plexus: destroyed. Propulsion matrix: offline. Weapons: damaged, regenerating.

Sensors detecting new technology from vessel identified as USS _Ra Cailum_. Energy signature reads modified warp drive.

The fleet entered formation with the _Ra Cailum_ , then jumped to warp, dragging them into a wormhole formed by the unstable drive.

Inter-universal signature. Highly relevant technology. Directive change to repairing central plexus: the collective must obtain this information.

The Borg would never get the chance to receive it as Sol brightened for a brief moment - and the star went supernova. The blast sending shockwaves which shattered Mercury, Venus - and moments later, Earth, Luna… and the Borg Cube.

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: Love it, hate it, or indifferent, _Generations_ is part of the canon. Just like _STO_ after CBS allowed Cryptic to put in the reboot timeline content. (Evil cackle)**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Though depending on your opinion on Cryptic's storytelling post-Delta Rising, whether that's a good thing or not is a YMMV issue.**

 **117Jorn: So yeah, the Madoka Arc was fairly short, yes. Next time though? Ohoho it's gonna be *sees red eyes in shadows* Ah shit…**

 **Ron the True Fan: (Hands phaser rifles to co-authors) We'll see you guys next time while we deal with these sons of bitches.**

 **Ja Ne!**


	15. Chapter 15

**Time/Date: ?**

 **Location: ?**

* * *

The fleet emerged from the unstable vortex, all bearing the scars of battle against the Borg in one way or another.

"Remind me before we do that again to work on the IDF generators." Corpsa puked into a sickbag as Sonja made her point clear. "To keep THAT from happening again."

"Agreed. First thing's first: we need to resupply. Scan the system for anything we can use for raw materials. After fighting the Borg, we're going to need them. And get these bodies disposed of." He looked at Mami, who was taking up Takeshi's usual seat. "Could you check on our guests? I think after all that's happened, they'll need a familiar face."

"But… I've never met them."

Ron facepalmed. "Honey, you had a bit of an accident recently," he informed. "You… lost your memory."

Mami's handed covered her mouth in shock. "Was anyone hurt?"

"No, just you," He assured, patting her on the head. "You lost all your memories after the crash. They befriended you after we got out of the hospital."

That cheered the blonde teenager up. "Oh, of course. Where are they?"

"Deck 5. The turbolift will take you there."

She walked over to the lift, entering like she belonged on board. "Shouldn't she be freaked the hell out?"

"I explained that things had changed a lot in sickbay," he informed shrugging. "I'll wing it. When she has enough, I'll tell her the truth."

* * *

Mami smiled as she exited the lift. Her father had told her that things had changed a lot, and they had.

Apparently, he wasn't kidding: he was in charge of a massive starship. But thankfully, some things hadn't changed.

His treatment of her, for example: a family motto was treat your friends like others would treat family, and treat your family like others would treat royalty. And he was doting on her as always, giving her a job that wasn't really a job.

The dots on the wall guided her to a room that was on the outer edge of the saucer section, and the doors slid open, allowing her to enter.

Inside, two people were sitting, a pink-haired girl being held by a ravenette, facing the stars while a bluenette was reading on a monitor, staying out of the way.

"I did this." The pinkette muttered, looking out at the darkness of space. "I killed everyone on Earth."

"You didn't cause this." The black-haired girl informed, "Kyubey did. He tricked you, just like he tricked everyone." The pinkette kept crying before Mami made her presence known. "Hello."

Everyone's heads spun around as they spotted the blond girl. "Mami?" The red-haired girl asked. "Y-you're alright?!"

"Yeah!" Mami informed, before frowning "But… sorry, after the… accident, dad says I… lost a lot of my memories…including… you guys…"

"You… lost your memories?"

"I had an accident. But I'll be fine. Dad actually sent me down to check on you." Homura was impassive, but Kyoko had other plans. "You told me your dad was dead, same as your mom."

"He's on the bridge right now. I can call him down if you want."

Kyoko smirked impishly. "Go and get him."

* * *

"We took minor damage to the impulse engines, but I'd rather be safe. Take, I'm going to send you out with the _Firestorm_ , scout out the system. Little bird's been getting a workout over the past month, hasn't she?"

"That she has," Takeshi replied. "I'll get it set up. Anything in particular I should look for? Resources, locals, some place to resettle all the refugees?"

"Do the words 'all of the above' mean anything to you?"

"You have to learn to stop being a smartass, Ron."

The captain smiled. "Come on, you enjoy it when it pisses off everyone else. Remember the time I drove Sela to literally pull hair out of her head?"

Takeshi sighed. "The incident that lead to the destruction of our last ship, you mean?" he asked. "I do like seeing how people react, yes, but I have learned that not all reactions are humorous to watch."

"I didn't know she'd pull a Picard and _ram us_!"

"You're a master of pissing people off, Ron; what'd you expect, a prolonged scream before she left?"

The response to Takeshi's question was a pure Ronism. "To be honest, yes, I expected her to scream at the top of her lungs before committing suicide. I had plans to supply cake to the entire crew. I even had a special cake idea for Larcei."

Takeshi chuckled slightly. "Only you, Ron," he said. "Still, that incident sticks out in my mind a lot these days, even though I don't want it to. So please - try and tone it down at least? I don't want anything like that to happen again."

Ron shrugged. "If it helps. Besides, we lose the ship, what happens to you? You get that promotion you always wanted. And sleeping on the job, though with you, it's never sleeping."

"Seriously? Sex jokes?"

"Takeshi, I still have that running tally." Takeshi wondered why he bothered staying with Ron for a year and a half before coming to the conclusion that Ron was just the best man to work for: didn't care about your quirks so long as your job was done.

That, and Luna would be putting up enough hours on subspace constantly calling him up. Siblings.

" _Hello? Dad?_ "

"I'll take the call, you get down to the _Firestorm_. Now I know how you feel."

"Sure thing, Boss," Takeshi replied, as he left the bridge.

Luna stood up from her secondary tactical post to follow her husband. "You enjoyed that."

"I don't follow, Luna."

"Oh, you know. Ron's a father now. It might not be INTENTIONAL, but it's revenge all the same for all the crap he's put us through. Although I know for a fact you enjoyed some of the crap he's put us through."

He would not deny that he got a certain pleasure out of the many assignments that he was forced to do because he was the XO. But for the not-so-enjoyable things…

Yes, Mami suddenly being thrown on an unprepared Ron WAS revenge enough.

* * *

Jaden held up the punching bag as Larcei continued to deliver a few punches against it. "Imagine it's a human or… human-ish alien," he said. "Hit hard, aim for weak points."

Larcei nodded, before aiming for what weak points her small frame could reach - namely, what would be knees.

"Come on, you gotta hit harder," Jaden motivated. "You don't have to kill - just demobilize them by-" Larcei kicked what would generally be considered the… _below the belt_ space with significant force. "…that works too…"

"I've seen Kaa-san kick Uncle Ron there when she was really mad at him," Larcei said. "It seemed to hurt a lot."

Jaden didn't get it. He'd seen that son of a bitch tank hits that would kill Elites, Brutes and even Spartans. But Lunamaria kicking him in the balls?

How did she do it? He had a likely answer - before he had those overpowered shields of his, most likely - but picturing it was both difficult and VERY funny: the unflappable Ron clutching his injured crotch while Luna was kicking him?

"Well… if it works," Jaden said, before he sighed. "Though that may not be enough… geez I can't believe she said yes to this…"

Larcei tilted her head "What are you talking about?"

Jaden knelt down, as he pulled off the sheath which held his old knife. "Your parents… gave me permission to give you this," he informed, presenting the knife to her. "It's my old combat knife… since I have another blade, I don't exactly need it, so… you can have it." Larcei's eyes widened as she reached to grab it, but he held it outside her grip. " _But_ , you need to promise me something… you use this knife for two things: survival and self-defense. Alright? This is _not_ a toy."

Larcei nodded. "Alright," she said. "I promise."

* * *

Homura Akemi regarded Mami as she continued to try to comfort Madoka. The girl she knew from so many timelines was highly unstable, needy and lonely. Now she seemed almost… normal. Like Madoka at the start of each loop.

She did not know why Mami thought Captain Pinkerton was her father. Both were blonde, yes, but that was it. Her musing ended as the man himself entered the room. "Sorry for being late: commanding a starship is a demanding job. Is there something wrong?"

Kyoko looked at the man, then Mami. "So, you're her dad?"

"Yes. Is there a problem?"

The redhead glared at the captain for a moment before answering. "She told me her parents died in that car crash."

"She must've been distraught at the time; I was in critical condition, close to death, but clearly not."

The time traveller knew why he was lying: Mami was in the room. "Dear, could you wait outside? I need to clear some things up for your friends."

Mami smiled. "Okay daddy," she nodded as she headed towards the door - not before giving Ron one last hug before leaving.

The door closed, and seconds after a hum was heard (privacy seal, from what Cassie had told her when they arrived) Ron faced Kyoko. "Look, clearly you know her, so I'm going to make this blunt: I might be from an alternate universe, but I'm the quantum counterpart of her father. That MAKES me her father, and the last thing I need is her going crazy."

"So, you're lying to her?"

"I'm doing what I can to give her a stable place to live. When she's ready, I'll tell her the truth, Sakura. Unless you want her to go mad and start shooting things?"

Kyoko's pale face was almost entertaining enough for Homura to laugh at, but with Mami's ribbons and her muskets, it was not a joke. "Yeah…I get the idea. So, what's the story?"

"That I survived the crash, barely, and it's been three years," he informed. "All of you befriended her, she got into an accident that cost her her memories of every day after the crash recently. As for the ship… well, I blame Madoka for that."

The pinkette started crying again. "You changed the timeline, little girl; I don't blame anyone but the Borg for what happened to Earth," Ron said. "You're all welcome to stay on board as long as you like - you and your families."

Madoka sniffled slightly, as Homura wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "Thank you… Mr. Pinkerton."

The doors opened, and Mami poked her head back in. "Dad?"

"It's alright; I just cleared up some confusion."

The com chirped before Sonja's voice came over the intercom. " _Bridge to Supreme Asshole. Repeat, bridge to Supreme Asshole._ "

Kyoko had a brief laugh at Ron's expense before the long-suffering man tapped his commbadge. "Pinkerton. What?"

" _We're picking up a lot of subspace distortions in-system. Remember that old trope of 'jump drives'?_ "

"Yes?"

" _Looks like there's a fuckton of them._ "

The captain groaned. "It never rains; ALWAYS pours. Get the _Firestorm_ on the horn and patch the transmission down here."

* * *

 **USS _Firestorm_**

* * *

Takeshi had seen a lot in his time with Ron: Borg. Alternate Timelines. More weirdness than the _Enterprise_ encounters in a single year.

But he'd never seen anything quite like this system before.

He'd seen Binaries. He'd seen Trinaries. He'd never seen a **_QUATERNARY_** star system before - not to mention one with twelve planets, ALL OF THEM habitable.

"Holy crap. What are the chances of us running into a system with no fewer than TWELVE Class-M planets?" Takeshi didn't answer Kim's question, as Ron would give him the answer: not very. Quaternary systems were rare to begin with, let alone one with intact planets.

"Well, Kim? What's out there?"

The human woman shook her head and began scanning. "Well, I'm picking up enough ships to say that interplanetary travel is an understatement. Closest planet has… human life on it: minimum of 700 million lifesigns."

"Well, at least we have a space faring society this time…" Takeshi sighed "Anything else?"

"All else, it looks-" Kim paused "What the… Commander, I'm picking up large doses of radiation on one… two… shit, _five_ planets… Nukes! They're getting nuked right now!"

"Son of a—"

"We've got an incoming hail from the _Ra Cailum_. I think the Captain knows what's happening."

"And because we know him so well, I'm disregarding the Prime Directive because he will. Inform the _Ra Cailum_ that we're intervening."

"Copy that, sir."

* * *

 **UNSC Saratoga**

* * *

"The system's getting nuked, sir, and Captain Pinkerton wants us to help whoever we can. They've got ships, and I guess he wants to help them and us at the same time."

"If we can get some ships, we can free up the space on the _Ra_ with all those refugees." Drake nodded, "Not to mention ease up the demand on _St. Elizabeth_. Plot a course to the system - scan comm traffic, see if there are any ships that need help."

" _Roger, Captain._ " Astarte nodded, " _I'm picking up comm traffic a few hundred kilo's away… On speakers now._ "

Drake paused as he let the comm play " _…is the Colonial Battlestar_ Mercury _to all colonial forces!_ " A feminine voice shouted, " _BSG-24 is under Cylon attack! Discontinue use of the CNP system! The Cylons have broken the CNP! Repeat…_ "

Crackling was heard over the radio. "The transmissions are being jammed, Captain." "Plot a course to intercept; sound general quarters. We've been looking for a better chance to test those fancy new weapons the Ra Cailum installed, and the Borg were too much for us. This will do."

The ship's acting AI, now heavily upgraded to almost match Cassie's standards, rolled her holographic eyes as she plotted a slipspace jump to the coordinates of the distress call, thankful for the Covenant tech that was ripped from the ships the _Ra Cailum_ slaughtered at Reach and the upgraded computers the Starfleeters installed. "Jumping to slipspace."

* * *

" _Baseships launching missiles! More nukes incoming!_ "

" _Multiple raiders on approach! Victor Squadron, Shocker Squadron, intercept!_ "

" _Frakking toasters are everywhere!_ "

Rear Admiral Sasha Urei growled, the _Mercury_ shuddering again from a cylon missile. ' _Baltar you FRAKING BASTARD!_ ' She thought, slamming her fists against the table. "Someone get those Jump Drives working damnit!"

"We're working on it, ma'am; systems are still haywire from the CNP hijack! We've got weapons and sublights, but that's it!" Mercury and her fleet had taken a cyber attack from three baseships, which shut everything down. If it weren't for the fact they were in the middle of a systems upgrade and their planes weren't given the Central Navigation Program, they would be dead. But purging it was taking time.

Time they didn't have.

' _If there are fraking gods up there, we could use a miracle right about now!_ ' The Admiral silently prayed. Little did she know… she was about to get that miracle.

"Ma'am, one of the Baseships just exploded!"

Sasha blinked "Excuse me?"

"Wait… DRADIS new contact! Unknown classification!"

Outside, one of the baseships turned to engage the new ship.

Right before it was flattened by a slug from an overpowered MAC gun, exploding.

"Baseship… vaporized. HOLY SHIT, that was a big ass gun."

Sasha was stunned. The new contact destroyed a baseship in ONE SHOT. "Ma'am, we're being hailed by the new ship."

"Open a channel!" She said, picking up the phone. "This is Rear Admiral Sasha Urei of the Colonial Battlestar _Mercury,_ I don't know who you are - but by the gods you sure as hell picked a great time to show up!"

" _Our pleasure, Admiral._ " A male voice replied, " _This is Captain Drake, UNSC_ Saratoga. _We'll keep you covered till you guys get squared away._ "

The bulk of the fighting was at Virgon, and they needed to rescue Fleet Admiral Nagala. Sasha was not an idiot; she knew the Colonies were lost. But humanity would survive. "Keep working on purging the CNP from all of our systems. As soon as we're cleared, I want a combat jump to Virgon. We'll save who we can and fall back to Ragnar Anchorage."

* * *

 **USS _Firestorm_**

* * *

Takeshi was moderately interested in the ship under attack from a pair of horseshoe-shaped fighters. Shaped like a massive alligator with twin flight pods, it was guarded by a number of small fighters.

One of which was carrying three nuclear missiles.

"Ready Quantum Torpedoes," Takeshi ordered, glad they'd been using a Cloaking Device that the Klingons used on some of their B'Rel-class Birds of Prey that allowed for the firing of torpedoes while cloaked. He centered his targeting scanners over the horseshoe fighter with the missiles.

"Torpedoes ready, sir."

Takeshi got the tone of a solid firing lock, before he pulled the trigger, sending a single torpedo towards the nuke-equipped fighter, before breaking off to another angle.

"Torpedo en route." The fighter exploded before one of the red-and-white fighters destroyed the remaining horseshoe.

"Sir, we're picking up transmissions from the capital ship. And it's directed at us, so I think the cloaking device is pretty much useless." Luna looked at her husband. "Let's lose the cloak, shall we?"

"Might as well," Takeshi admitted. "We're not following the Prime Directive, and I don't think we need the element of surprise anymore. Drop the cloak, and put them through."

Rina opened a radio channel, allowing them to make contact. "Channel open."

* * *

William Adama, commander of the battlestar _Galactica_ , was confused by Starbuck's reports of a blue torpedo hitting the Raider packing nukes that were most likely being pointed at his ship before Gaeta reported another ship appearing out of nowhere.

It wasn't anything like an _Orion_ -Class battlestar: they would have had visual contact. "Dee, get that thing on the horn." Anastasia Dualla, the ship's comms officer, opened a channel to the unknown contact. "Done, sir." Adama picked up a receiver, putting it to his ear. "This is Commander William Adama of the battlestar _Galactica_. Identify yourself."

There was a moment of silence. " _OK, ranks must be slightly different there, if a Commander is in charge of a ship that size,_ " came a male voice over the radio. " _This is Commander Takeshi Yamato of the Federation Starship_ Firestorm _. Apologies for the rude entrance, but you seemed to be in a bit of a bind._ "

"You saved our asses, _Firestorm_ Actual. The Cylons would've killed us if you didn't take out those nukes. But how the frak did you do that?"

" _We've got a cloaking device. Long story short, we're here to help._ "

"We'll need cover while we head to Ragnar Anchorage, Commander: my ship's magazines are empty."

" _Understood,_ " came Takeshi's reply. " _We'll keep watch. Though we'll need the coordinates for this anchorage - I don't think we use the same methods of FTL travel._ "

"We'll need fifteen minutes to spool up our FTL drives, and to recover our Vipers. If you can help with SAR ops, we'd be grateful: we've got a number of pilots out there." His XO, Saul Tigh, gave him a warning look. "Bill, just because these people saved our asses doesn't mean we can trust them."

"We don't have time, Saul: the old girl needs ammo, and we only have four Raptors. If they can speed up our rescue ops, the faster we can get to Ragnar."

" _Understood,_ " Takeshi replied. " _Transporter room, lock onto any lifesigns drifting in space and beam them directly to sickbay!_ "

* * *

The _Ra Cailum_ dropped out of warp, heading for a planet that had a large shipyard in orbit under attack by massive numbers of fighters.

"Mobius, kill those fighters. Deploy every shuttle we've got: if it's got weapons, I want it in space shooting at these assholes. Neutralize the nukes before they destroy every ship in the yard."

Corpsa gave a mocking salute before firing the ship's phasers to intercept the fighters, though they were slightly too late: the yard had taken heavy damage from at least three nukes, and three of the ships were already breaking up. One ship, a monstrous ship 600 meters longer than the _Ra Cailum_ , was trying to escape the yard. IFF IDed the ship as _Pegasus_ , and was powering up.

"Huh, nice ship." Jaden said, walking onto the bridge. "Kinda reminds me of 21st century carriers… it's friendly, right?"

"It's getting nuked, and we're shooting at the assholes firing the nukes. I'd say that makes them friendly. Make yourself useful, Spartan, and get ready to secure the wrecks." Jaden raised an eyebrow before Ron looked back. "You're not a bridge officer, so I'm just putting you to work. We've got ten thousand civilians on this thing, and I'd rather them not be on board. Our shields are at 30% with the demands on life support, and the only weapons we've got that can be used at full power are our photon torpedoes, which have their own power sources."

"So… secure the wrecks for your engineering crews so we can turn them into refugee ships?"

"That was the general idea."

Jaden shrugged "Makes sense to me," He said, "I'll get the teams set up. Let's hope these people play nice."

* * *

 **Battlestar _Pegasus_ \- CIC**

* * *

Helena Cain watched the DRADIS screen as the contacts disappeared one by one. The Cylons were getting slaughtered by some unknown ship. They had a fighting chance to kick the chrome bastards in the teeth.

Kendra Shaw, who was working on the FTLs, moved to comms to replace the unconscious Louis Hoshi. "Admiral, the unknown ship is hailing us. They want to talk to us."

Cain picked up the phone "This is Rear Admiral Helena Cain, of the Colonial Battlestar _Pegasus_ ," she spoke. "To whom am I speaking too?"

" _Captain Ronald Pinkerton of the Federation starship_ Ra Cailum _. No offense, but you got fucked up. My sensors are picking up nuclear strikes on at least 5 different planets. My people will help yours secure the wrecks, that way we can use them to evac as many civilians as we can._ "

Evacuate? "Captain, I want to talk to you in person. Prepare to receive a Raptor."

" _We'll come to you, if you don't mind. We've got something called a transporter: it allows one person to be beamed from one location to another._ "

"Teleportation?" Cain rolled her eyes. "You're making that up." There was a short pause, before she heard a strange noise behind her…

"Nope, it's real." She whirled around as a man and two other individuals seemed to appear right behind her out of thin air. "Admiral Cain I presume?"

Her jaw was on the ground. "What, how—"

"Alternate universe; technology's different. Now, I need to know how many engineers you've got; we've got a lot of ships that need repairs."

Cain didn't listen. All she kept picturing was nukes being beamed onto Cylon baseships. "Captain, under Colonial civil and military law, I am taking command of your ship." Cain wanted that tech, so she would do things two ways: one, she'd try the legal method. If that didn't work… threat of death always worked.

"Admiral, I'm not one of your citizens, nor is my ship… Colonial, you said? I don't fall under the subject of your legal crap. You can't win a military victory here: your worlds are turning to ash. I'm offering to SAVE as many civilians as I can."

His words may as well fallen on deaf ears, as Cain just pulled out her sidearm - Ron recalling it as some type of FN Five-Seven, before she aimed at Ron.

BLAM.

"…was… that supposed to do something?"

Cain's eyes were wide as the man looked unimpressed by trying to blow his brains out. "Personal deflector shields," Ron shrugged. "I can stop shots fired from this ship's main batteries with them." He landed two strikes on her stomach, knocking the wind out of her before taking her gun. "Yeah, you made a mistake. One, people who try to kill me usually fail. Two, you tried to take over my ship. That compounds the third." He pointed the gun at her head. "I kill people who try to kill me." He returned the favor in the most ironic way possible.

Helena Cain's brains were splattered across one of the plotting displays from a bullet from her own gun. "So, anyone else going to try to kill me, or is there someone with an ounce of SENSE in their head in here?!"

A man rose his hand. "Who are you?"

"Commander… J-Jurgen Belzen," The man informed, "I am… _was_ Cain's… XO… "

"Well, congratulations, Commander, you just got promoted to CO," Ron said. "She threatened my ship and crew, so I was WELL within my rights to blow her brains out, so don't take it personally. Now, I need to know how many people you've got that can hold a wrench: we've got at least 20 ships to fix for refugee carriage."

Belzen nodded. "A-aye, sir."

"Relax, Commander, I'm not going to put a bullet in your head," he said. "Unless you do what she did."

"I'm not a revenge-obsessed idiot, sir."

"Then we'll get along _fine_ …"

* * *

The _Saratoga_ and _Mercury's_ fleet arrived at a location where a number of civilian ships were sitting, several jumping off to God knows where, but a smaller number being left behind. "Son of a bitch; those ships don't have FTLs, and we're picking up Cylon contacts! Saratoga, mind giving us a hand again?"

Drake took a brief glance at his ship's armament count. 50mms were good to go, Archer Kais (an improved version of the UNSC missile with superior tracking and shield penetration made by Sonja) were ready to fire and the MAC was reloaded. "We're good to fight, _Mercury_." He informed, "Heading in."

The _Saratoga_ sped forward as the Battlestars in _Mercury's_ fleet launched their complement of Vipers out. The sudden arrival of the military ships did exactly what Drake had hoped - as the Cylons adjusted their course to deal with the bigger threats, leaving the civilian ships for later. "Fire off first salvo - Archer pods A through C, fire in a wide-spread." Drake ordered.

The _Saratoga_ fire off a salvo of Archer missiles from their pods - the missiles dividing up creating a hail of missile fire - all locking onto the incoming Cylon fighters. The Raiders attempted to evade - but the Archer Kais were much more agile than the original UNSC versions, as they tracked their every movement before there were multiple puffs of fire and smoke from the distance as the Raiders were obliterated.

"Enemy fighters destroyed. Should I contact the Ra Cailum and ask if they can spare an engineering team?" Drake shook his head. "No, Astarte, contact Mercury: see if their people have a few spare FTL drives to fit to the civilians. We'll fly top cover while they do their jobs. And keep searching for additional military contacts; I think we're going to need more guns by the end of this."

* * *

Sasha hung up the receiver, rubbing both of her temples the second afterward. "How many Raptors are out of commission?"

"We recovered 42 birds that are beyond repair, ma'am, but we can use them for parts. Why?"

"Captain Drake wants to know if we can spare them for the civilian ships, and I agree." She said, "And send out as many birds as you can to make contact with any surviving fleet units, especially _Galactica_."

"Aye Ma'am,"

Sasha sighed, as she allowed herself to take a seat. This day started off as the worst moment in Colonial history since the Cylon War… while it still was, things were starting to get just a _little_ bit better, now they seemed to have some very big, very dangerous friends.

' _Just gotta stay on their good side…_ ' She thought, ' _Just hoping no one does anything_ stupid…'

"Raptors 48 and 97 are away, ma'am: they'll try to make contact with BSGs 47 and 61. 201 and 43 are refueling, but I'll send them out as soon as possible." Sasha would be happy if BSG-61 didn't survive: last thing they needed was Cain's revenge bullshit. "Prep a Raptor to jump to Ragnar; Galactica's last message said they were heading there to rearm. And I have Admiral Nagala's last order to perform."

* * *

 **Battlestar _Pegasus_**

* * *

The remains of BSG-61 ( _Pegasus_ , _Triton_ , and _Nightingale_ ) now entered formation with the Ra Cailum, whose engineering crews had done what they could to repair the wrecks. Half of them were flyable, but scrap metal: they'd be only useful as raw materials. The more intact ships had FTL problems. That Sonja could deal with.

But Ron had to head to Caprica to rescue the defense fleet at the request of Commander Belzen, so Jaden was left on _Pegasus_ to help with the repairs. "Why the hell would Pinkerton keep you here?"

"Probably because I've got some respect with the Starfleet people, and he's hoping that'll make me a good representative for him." Jordan shrugged "Personally, I think he just wants me busy… don't mind too much though," he looked around the vessel's interior. "Nice change of scenery than being on _Ra_ all day… reminds me of being on a UNSC warship. I like what the Colonials were trying with this ship… it's like a hybrid between a carrier and a battleship."

"That was the idea." Belzen confirmed, "The original _Columbia_ -Class didn't pan past the drawing boards, but we got the _Jupiter_ -Class right. Hell, _Galactica_ 's still around from those days."

"Still?"

"She was going to be retired this year." He shrugged, "Budget cuts. The Ministry of Education then decided to turn that proud bucket of bolts into a museum ship. Fraking disgrace, if you ask me; a warship should be destroyed in battle, not as a tourist attraction."

That reminded Jaden of the _St. Elizabeth_ , in a way. But a little Starfleet help turned that colony ship into a working refugee ship once again.

On that same note, he'd gotten some messages that the other ships had found a small fleet of refugees, and that they were escorting them to some place called Ragnar. "I agree with you there," he said. "The UNSC's war with the Covenant's drawing on resources - we can't _afford_ to mothball starships anymore. Now that Reach's fallen, giving the Covies a clean shot at Earth now…"

"Yeah, who-" Belzen began to say, before he processed what Jaden had just said.

Earth.

"Wait… did you say _Earth_?" He asked, causing Jaden to blink. "As in the 13th Tribe?!"

"Uh, wha?" He asked, "Well… yeah I said Earth, but… what the hell is a 13th Tribe?" Belzan was about to speak before he rose his hand. "You know what? Don't worry - once we get back with the rest of your people, I'll have Ron explain our situation."

"As long as he doesn't put a bullet in my head."

Jaden shook his head "Come on, Cain threatened to take him hostage in order to take control of his ship; he had the right to put her in the ground," he assured. "You're just asking questions; he likes questions. A little too much."

* * *

 **Ragnar Anchorage - USS _Firestorm_**

* * *

The oort cloud of the system was called Ragnar. Takeshi tried not to think of the fittingness of the name, seeing as it was just missing two letters.

On the other hand, he was about to meet Commander Adama face to face, but because he wasn't an asshole like Ron, he decided against the transporters.

That and he took any excuse to fly a shuttlecraft. Maybe he'd get to fly one of those fancy fighters while he was at it if all went well.

"Sonja's going to be jealous, you know."

"Because we get to be the first to see a new ship like this?" Takeshi asked.

"Exactly. Sure, it's a piece of crap compared to the _Ra Cailum_ , but those FTL drives would come in REAL handy." His wife had a point as the pair entered the only Type-10 shuttle on the escort and prepared for takeoff. With the real amount of work, you could jump from Ocampa to Earth in five seconds.

Janeway was NOT going to be happy with them.

"Point taken," Takeshi remarked, as he lifted the shuttle off of the pad, flying through the open doors and into space, angling towards the _Galactica_.

At this point, Takeshi took the time to study the _Galactica_. Clearly, it was a warship, fit with multiple 600cm gun turrets and heavy armor plating, although most of the hull armor was seemingly missing.

The glass enclosures over the starboard flight pod entrances weren't giving him any good ideas, either.

Or his grinning wife. Clearly, she and Ron's life prior to the academy had corrupted the woman. "Luna, no."

"Come on, don't tell me you've never broken windows before."

"Not in the vacuum of space," Takeshi snapped. "We need to spend less time with Ron, clearly." He then opened up the comm system on the frequency that _Galactica_ had been using earlier. " _Galactica_ , this is the Shuttlecraft _Cyclone_ off of the _Firestorm_ , requesting landing clearance."

"Cyclone, Galactica _LSO: reduce speed to 050, approach port side hangar. Checkers red; call the ball._ " Takeshi didn't get it.

"It's a manual landing; he wants you to slow down to 50 kph and if you've got the ball, you can land."

"How would you know that?"

"Riza."

WAY too much time with her stepsiblings, indeed. Sighing, he said, "Roger, I have the ball," before following the instructions he'd been given.

The shuttle landed on the obvious lift, which was taken into the hangar bay. "Atmospheric pressure is .97, gravity slightly higher than Earth's," Luna remarked. "We'll be right at home." Takeshi opened the hatch as the deckhands pushed the shuttle into the ship with aid from heavy lift tools. It was faster than they expected; they were clearly expecting something heavier.

"Well, let's meet the locals," Takeshi said as the pair stood up from their seats and stepped out of the shuttle into the hangar.

A man with black hair wearing a jumpsuit walked over to them. "Uh, welcome to the _Galactica_. I'm Chief Tyrol. Thanks for the save; you saved a lot of my people."

"Commander Yamato. Our pleasure, Chief. Our captain probably would've done the same thing."

"Wait, captain? You're not in command of your ship?"

"I'm in command of the _Firestorm_ , yes," Takeshi replied. "However, the _Firestorm_ 's just an auxiliary craft for our main ship, the _Ra Cailum_."

"Which is… bigger."

"Much bigger. And, as much as my husband hates to admit it, meaner. It could tank the Firestorm for days."

"Luna, I already have a bruised ego. Please don't make it any worse."

Luna smiled sweetly. "Of course. I take it Commander Adama is in CIC?"

Tyrol shook his head to clear it. "Uh, yes, ma'am. I'll take you there. Cally! Take over for me!"

"Got it, Chief!"

Takeshi and Luna proceeded to follow Tyrol out of the hangar, to head to their ship's CIC. "Not sure if I should mention this, but I saw a lot of… confusing things on your ship on the way in," he said. "Missing hull plates, windows on your starboard pod and not your port…"

"Yeah… _Galactica_ was being decommissioned when we got the news of the attacks."

"It's a museum ship? Oh, boy, Ron's going to be MAD. Even the museum ships back home are kept to modern standards and ready for active duty. We just… hide it well."

Tyrol glanced at Luna for a second. "Ron? Who's that?"

"Our Captain," Takeshi remarked. "Also Luna's adopted brother, and my brother-in-law by extension, and one of the scariest people to make angry."

"Remind me never to make him mad."

"You probably already HAVE by letting it happen. But the _Ra Cailum_ 's an _Odyssey_ -class starship: he'll get this thing operational in a week."

The trio walked through the massive ship, entering CIC, and Takeshi was reminded of an old battleship: everything was manually operated. "Commander?" An old man in a blue uniform turned to face Tyrol from the central plotting table. "Chief. I see we have guests."

"Commander Takeshi Yamato of the _Firestorm_ , sir," Takeshi introduced. "This is my wife and security chief, Luna."

"That's irregular; military personnel don't marry other military personnel."

"We're not actually military."

An older man, if his bald head was any indication, looked at the two. "Really? You're flyin' around in a warship; I'd say that makes you military."

"And you are?"

"Colonel Saul Tigh, XO. And what the frak makes you not military?"

Takeshi sighed. "The United Federation of Planets Starfleet is a bit… more than a military, Colonel," he said. "Rather, Starfleet is Exploration and Military, rolled up into one."

"I'll take your word for it."

"Don't believe us, you'll believe Ron. He's probably on his way. Whoever nuked your worlds can't jam subspace comms: we told him where we are a few hours ago."

Adama returned to the plotting table before looking up at the sensor monitor. "Commander, why did you help us? Obviously, you're more powerful than us or the Cylons, so that begs the question of why you did it."

"You think we want something from you?"

"My father taught me that everyone wants something. That's the only reason they do things for others."

"I see," Takeshi replied. "Well, to be honest, we just didn't like seeing those things you were fighting just go about nuking everything."

"Would it change your opinion that we created those things? That 60 years ago, they rose up because they thought, correctly, that they were being treated like slaves?"

"Did you make peace?"

"We signed an armistice."

Luna snorted. "That means 'temporary cessation of hostilities', Commander." Adama glared at Luna, and she actively flinched.

THAT surprised Takeshi: only two people could do that.

And Ron was on the _Ra Cailum_ , with his infinitely terrifying mother being back home in their universe.

"We send an officer to a space station every year to keep up diplomatic relations. They send no one."

Takeshi was the one to snort this time. "Yeah, _that_ doesn't scream someone's gearing up for round 2," he said sarcastically. After a moment, he sighed. "There is a slight pragmatic issue, I will admit. We've… kinda gotten displaced a long way from home, and on our last stop before coming to this region, we had to pick up about a hundred-thousand refugees. Even the _Ra Cailum_ , which my ship is just an auxiliary for, is starting to be a bit strained in terms of occupancy. We have to either get some more ships to hold them, or resettle them someplace."

"The Colonies are out of the question."

"Nuclear bombardment kinda does that, so we figured as much, Commander."

Takeshi facepalmed. "Really, Luna?"

"Being a smartass is what we do best. Even you do it, husband of mine." Takeshi could not deny that the smartassness happened a lot. Again, he blamed his brother-in-law. And his actual sister.

"When will your CO get here, Commander? I suspect he and I are going to have a long talk about the military situation."

"Should be soon," Takeshi replied. "Last I heard from him, he'd helped out one of your other ships, though the lady in charge tried to take the _Ra Cailum_ over, and tried killing him in the process. Naturally, she failed, and suffered the fate of anyone who tries to kill him."

"Who?"

"Ship was named _Pegasus_."

"Helena Cain." Adama groaned, rolling his eyes "What, did she try to take your captain hostage?"

Luna grinned, confirming Adama's fears. "And he put a bullet in her head because he thought Cain was a threat to his crew."

"That, and anyone that tries to kill Ron ends up being killed **_by_** him, because of their idiocy," Takeshi remarked. "Guy's like a walking Darwin Award generator."

"Excuse me?"

"In short, stupid things usually end up with people dying. Natural selection and all that. They try to kill him, he kills them back. And he doesn't fail."

CO and XO shared a look. "We'll avoid making him mad."

"Making _Galactica_ into a semi-operational museum ship will. He's a fan of function."

"Blame President Adar. At least he's dead, so your captain doesn't have to be the… what did you call it? Walking Darwin Award generator?"

Neither Starfleet officer bothered hiding their amusement. Their CO was considered the worst diplomat in the fleet, but he was the best deterrent. Shoot at him, you _die_.

"Anyway, once he gets here we can see about restoring your ship to proper functionality, maybe even improving it a bit," Takeshi said.

"Firestorm _to Yamato: the Supreme Asshole is calling again._ "

Takeshi facepalmed. "Whose idea was it to start calling Ron that?"

"Sonja's."

"Oh, I should've expected that. Can you patch him through _Galactica's_ comms, Rina?"

" _Already doing it, Commander,_ " Rina replied.

Takeshi approached the plotting table, picking up one of the handsets after Adama gestured to it. "Ron, what's up?"

" _We're en route with a fleet of ships; most of them are empty, but we managed to beam up a few civilians from the ground. We're almost empty, but we're going to have to make a few trips to pick up the survivors on each planet. How's life on your end?_ "

"We're at an anchorage the locals have in their oort cloud - Ragnar, they call it," Takeshi said. "We've made contact with a warship named _Galactica_ , though it's… not in the best of condition."

" _Got hit hard?_ " Ron asked.

"No, more along the lines of being mothballed to become a museum ship," Takeshi replied. "You'll see the full extent when you get here, Ron, but this thing needs a **_SERIOUS_** overhaul."

" _Very well; we're enroute. Help them as much as you can._ "

* * *

Within the Oort Cloud, the _Ra Cailum_ escorted BSG-61 inside along with its assortment of escorts, meeting with the starships of BSG _Mercury_ , and roughly 100 civilian vessels which were surrounding the battlestar in the center: BS-75 _Galactica_.

"Takeshi was right." Ron said, his eye twitching as he looked out the main screen "I AM pissed." Attached to the station was a very stripped-down version of _Triton_ : 70% of the armor was gone and the starboard pod was windowed over. "I'm going over there, taking my compression rifle to those windows and damning the idiot who ordered that to happen." Sonja raised an eyebrow from her post, gleefully noting the drop in power consumption from the lack of excess refugees, who were now on board hastily repaired refugee ships.

At least she could refit them.

"I think he's already dead, boss."

"I'll ask Q to bring him back. So I can kill him AGAIN. Hail _Galactica_ and tell Adama I'm beaming aboard."

Cassie sighed as Ron stepped onto the transporter pad. "I would suggest taking a shuttle so you don't give them heart attacks," she said. "But I know you won't listen…"

"Speed over shock. Those Cylons probably know we're here by now. Energize."

* * *

The now-Fleet Admiral was getting annoyed by Roslin's prattle. With help from the _Ra Cailum_ and her allies, they could reclaim the colonies and make the Cylons go away forever. Instead, she was trying to convince him to run.

He was stopped from talking by a shower of light that deposited a man as tall as he was wearing a uniform that was like, yet unlike Commander Yamato's at the edge of the room. And scaring the hell out of the president and Admiral.

"Huh. Very spartan," he commented, before noticing the stares. "Sorry about that; assholes are probably on the way and I didn't want to waste time." He walked over and extended his hand to Adama. "Captain Ronald Pinkerton, UFP starship _Ra Cailum_."

Adama was still taken aback at the man who literally _appeared out of thin air_. He somehow managed to compose himself, before returning the gesture "A-Admiral William Adama, Colonial Battlestar _Galactica_." He said "Before I thank you and your crew for all you've done… How the _Frak_ did you do that?"

"Quantum teleportation. We call it a transporter; basically, it turns you from matter to energy, transmits you to another location and reconverts you to matter." Ron explained "Took a while to overcome the Heisenberg Principle, but as you noticed, we did. Safest way to travel. Now, I hate to tell you this, but we REALLY need to get out of this nebula; there's a bit of a massive fleet of assholes coming here, and the _Ra Cailum_ can't hold off a fleet of 75 of those starfish-shaped ships, their fighters and gunships while defending the refugees."

Adama's eyes widened in surprise. 75 baseships? Against the _Ra Cailum_ , her own fleet, and the surviving Colonial Fleet, they'd have an even fight.

But with the civilians…

"Bill…" Roslin spoke after gaining her senses back.

The newly promoted fleet admiral sighed, bowing his head slightly. "…Where do you suggest we go, Captain?" He asked.

"We can't head to Earth; not only are we 75000 lightyears from there, we also seem to be…150000 years in the past compared to my time," He said. "At that time, humanity there was still working with flint knives and bearskins. And we usually don't like to visit races that hadn't developed space travel; got a rule against it, actually."

Adama was not impressed, and he made it known. By staring into Ron's eyes, and in a metaphysical way, his very soul.

The Captain was moderately disturbed by that glare, although he was used to things much like it. "We CAN, however, bring you with us." He quickly informed. "We've got something that will make sure the Cylons can't follow us." The badge on ron's jacket beeped before he tapped it. "Pinkerton."

" _Boss, we've got a bit of a problem. Remember that dilithium we've been using for the wormhole drive?_ "

Ron groaned. "Yes, Sonja. What is the problem?"

" _We need to recrystallize it. It'll take me a couple of weeks to synthesize the compounds found in it, but that's not the real problem. We're going to need to strip a couple dozen asteroids down to nothing._ "

"Staying in the colonies to do that is… Ill advised." Adama sighed, "If we're gonna do this… We're going to have to leave the Cyrannus System completely. Where the Cylons won't be able to follow us as easily."

"We can do that," Ron nodded. "We'll need to look at those FTL drives of yours; Belzen didn't want us to, and I decided to respect his wishes."

"Even though you could have shot him," Adama commented.

Ron smiled and laughed. "Admiral, I shot Cain because she shot me first and tried to take me hostage in order to take control of my ship," he said, "I have a bit of a rule regarding shit like that. If you show me respect, I show you respect. Try to kill me, I WILL kill you. Attempt to hurt my crew… well. Cain learned the hard way."

Adama couldn't help but smirk slightly… this man was starting to remind him of himself bit by bit. "I think we can work something out then," he nodded. "We have a few damaged Raptors with intact FTL drives, I'll see if I can get them sent to you."

"Grand. I'll have them beamed back to my ship. As soon as we figure out your nav system, we'll plot you a jump out of this storm."

Roslin nearly jumped out of her seat. "You can do that?"

"Superior sensor technology, miss…"

Roslin adjusted her glasses in an attempt to compose herself. "Laura Roslin. I'm the President of the Colonies."

"More like Lyndon Baines Johnson part two: I thought Richard Adar was the President."

Adama deadpanned it in a way Ron found hilarious. "He got nuked."

"HA! Admiral, I'm going to like working with you!"

* * *

Half an hour later, the fleet was in formation and ready for… jump. Sonja was as giddy as Rutia was when she tore those jump drives apart, and with a little help from Gaeta, they were ready to leave.

"Cassie, status on those jump coordinates?"

" _We're good to jump, Ron: coordinates are as far as we can get the Colonial jump drives at this moment in time._ "

Jaden clicked his seatbelt on. "Heard from the Colonials this Jumping thing makes ya hurl the first few times," he said, bracing himself.

"At least it's not dimensional shifting."

"What's that do?" The entire bridge crew deadpanned an answer for the Spartan.

"It slowly kills you."

A low horn was heard before the voice of Galactica's comms officer came in. " _All ships, Galactica: stand by for jump in five, four, three, two—_ "

"Cassie, jump!"

Outside, the Ra Cailum disappeared in a flash of light, followed by the UNSC ships, the XCOM-captured Ethereal ships and finally the Colonials.

The Cylons would not be happy.

* * *

 **Cylon staging point**

* * *

Cavil was PISSED.

No, that was putting it lightly, he wasn't pissed. He was FUMING.

Forty years. _Forty_ years worth of planning, plotting, placing sleeper agents across colonial space, forty years of military buildup and development of their new Raiders, Centurions, and Baseships. Forty years… and almost all of it was undone by a bunch of human ships which turned everything they had into _tinfoil!_

They had retreated to Ragnar, as expected, but as soon as their forces sent in a raider scout… they found nothing.

NOTHING. They had somehow plotted a jump inside the storm.

Even THEY hadn't been able to do that! "Alright, brothers and sisters, we have a problem. We have to find the humans, quickly. Otherwise, we'll have to deal with the survivors in another century!"

A four and five, the ones' 'yes-men', nodded enthusiastically. The threes and twos had their doubts, the eights and sixes…

He wasn't bothering.

"Finding them won't be easy… let alone fighting them," the Four said. "We fired everything we had at them, and we didn't even make a _dent_ to their armor. We don't even know who these… _things_ are to begin with!"

"And they clearly have superior weapons and computers."

Cavil knew that, and was about to tell them as the room darkened slightly as something… formed in the room. It was a pool of blackness, and from it… a being emerged.

It was missing an arm, and was ornately decorated with red and black coloring. "So… you are the attempted murderers of man. I am not impressed."

Every humanoid Cylon took a step back at the… figure, as the Centurions aimed their weapons at it. The being just glanced at the Centurions however… and they exploded.

"W-Wha-what the hell are _you_?!" Cavil demanded at the figure, who glanced at him - its gaze strong enough to shut him up.

"You may call me T'ket," it responded. "For why I am here… you are lucky, for today… the enemy, of my enemy… is my friend."

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: OH FUCK NO!**

 **117Jorn: Well… looks like the Cylons made a big friend… S**t…**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Oh, Jeez - the one enemy in Star Trek Online worse than the Borg. Well… This Is Gonna Suck.**

 **117Jorn: It's gonna be worse than that, Take… until next time…**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**


	16. Chapter 16

**Time/Date: circa 150,000 BCE**

 **Location: Delta Quadrant**

* * *

The Cylon baseship had evolved. From a disk on top of a disk into a pair of Ys, one on top of the other, inverted, replacing a mixed gun-missile battery layout for pure missiles and more advanced Raiders.

But a baseship of either era was powerless against the power of an Odyssey-Class starship's main phaser array, which was used in defense of the battlestar _Galactica_ and her fellow Colonial ships.

It was getting annoying for the crew of the _Ra Cailum_. "That's the fifth baseship they've sent. Do they have nothing better to do then die in droves?" While Ron was more then happy to remove the Cylons' stupidity from them, a prisoner they found on the anchorage said they just resurrected, and Cassie confirmed it.

It was rather difficult to be a 'walking Darwin Award Generator', as his brother in law put it, if they just came back in a new body!

For the most part though, the Capital ships handled the Baseships, and they generously leave the Cylon Raiders for Mobius Squadron, the UNSC fighter pilots, and the Colonial Vipers.

"Sir, I've been working on a way to boost the range of our FTL jumps. And one of the Raptors we modified found an asteroid field rich in ores and what we need. If you don't mind, I'd like to link up with _Galactica's_ computers to make sure it works."

"Cassie, you don't have a body, and their computers aren't networked, let alone wireless. I'll ask Lieutenant Gaeta to beam over; you can work on it together. Take, how are the civilians doing?"

"Better now that they have more ships to spread across," Takeshi remarked.

"Chief Tyrol's been clamoring to upgrade and manufacture more of those Mk VII Vipers using our tech, Boss. Your vote?"

Ron sighed. The Colonials had wanted access to their technology, even if it was just so they could survive.

Fuck it. "Do it. And call Admiral Adama and President Roslin: I want to talk to them in my ready room in fifteen minutes."

* * *

Homura Akemi walked through the halls of the _Odyssey_ -Class starship, heading for the quarters used by Madoka, her family and Sayaka. Her parents were out; her mother was helping the Colonials try to rebuild parts of their pre-Fall lives, although that wasn't happening anytime soon, while her father was busy working on the agro ships.

Man had a green thumb; why not put it to good use?

Still, that meant that Madoka was by herself for the moment. Homura hadn't tried being… close to anyone, especially her Madoka… for many, many centuries of looping. But now, given that her quest was essentially over… perhaps she could try now…

She rang the chime, followed by Madoka's sweet voice. "Who is it?"

"…Homura Akemi."

"Homura-chan! Please, come in!"

The doors opened, allowing her to enter. The room was moderately colorful, like the rest of the ship, and the same size as standard crew quarters throughout the ship. The only exception was, of course, the windows, which were highly angled due to their location on the saucer section.

"Hello, Homura! I just put Tetsuya to sleep, and… well, I haven't been able to sleep since we… left home."

"Madoka, that was 4 days ago. You cannot keep this up."

And indeed, it seemed that Madoka was barely able to stay on her feet, gently swaying as if in a breeze, before Homura caught her as she began to slump forward.

"I'm ok, Homu—"

She began to fall backwards, only for Homura to catch her via stopping time briefly. "You will rest. Am I clear?"

"But… All I see are the people I… that I condemned…"

"You may have made the wish, but you did not grant it or foresee the consequences. This is not your fault."

"I… I guess…" Madoka muttered. "But… but still…"

Homura sighed. She'd dealt with her PTSD many, many loops ago, but she was still able to recognize the symptoms, and it looked like Madoka was experiencing them at full force.

She mentally shrugged. Well, in for a penny, in for a pound, as the saying went. "If you would like, I… I could stay with you while you slept."

Madoka looked at Homura. "Really?"

"I will stay with you."

Madoka yawned. "Ok… I'll go to bed."

Homura guided her to an empty bed, putting her down before she began to nod off.

"My Madoka. You won't suffer ever again."

"That's what YOU think."

Homura abruptly turned at the voice, and she saw what looked like the western actor John de Lancie, wearing the same kind of uniform Ron was.

Of course, given that she had watched _Star Trek The Next Generation_ during some of her loops, she immediately knew who it was. "Q." she stated.

"You cheat! You know who I am!"

"Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations. Captain Pinkerton said 'all things are reality, all things are fictional'. I have known who you are for many years."

Q sighed. "Well, shucks, Homerun, you cheated. And ruined my first attempt."

"Attempt?"

"Yes, little girl. The Incubators and you seriously screwed up the multiverse. Ronnie boy and his people weren't supposed to be here. But if I change anything, that son of a bitch will just beat the shit out of me."

Homura was a little confused, but she understood the gist of things. "So, you're saying that the Incubators… threw things out balance?" she asked.

"Yes. And I had to spend 50 of your years fixing it because EVERY TIME I was done, what happens? You reset the timeline! So I had to do a little cheating of my own and bring the _Ra Cailum_ here. Ronnie's good at dealing with problems like this."

"I noticed," Homura remarked blandly. "Are you saying that Madoka making a wish and defeating Walpurgisnacht… was supposed to reset the balance?"

"Yes. My job was to make sure Krimhild was destroyed. But what do YOU do? Reset the timeline. Again. So I had enough and diverted Ron here. But Madoka there caused something else."

"The Borg."

"The Incubators were powerful enough to challenge the Q once. But the Borg took care of that, because they were still corporeal. So we made a bit of a failsafe that you built up to. But unless I deal with her, it will cause the destruction of all creation. And I want to leave as soon as possible: if Ron finds out I'm on board, he'll take a chainsaw to me."

"I… I see…" Homura remarked, not really getting it at all. "If you hurt her, though…"

"I'm giving her back her powers! To a degree: think like you and that busty blonde."

"His daughter?"

Q paled. "Ok, I'm leaving as soon as I'm done with her and Miki." He snapped his fingers, a dull soul gem hitting the ground. It was Madoka's, and only served as a reminder.

"So… she will be able to fight, but… she won't become a Witch, right?" Homura asked.

"Just like the rest of you. Besides, there are timelines where you witched out. YOU were always the bigger threat."

Q disappeared before the comm chirped. " _Bridge to Akemi. Did you see an asshole on board?_ "

Homura sighed. "Yes, I did," she said. "And… it seems that Madoka's wish and your 'wormhole drive' were not the only things to bring you to my universe…"

" ** _Q! I WILL FIND YOU AND INTRODUCE MY CHAINSAW TO YOUR FACE!_** "

Homura was tempted to stop time and beat Ron up, but Madoka never awoke. If anything, she smiled. Homura was overthinking this. So she climbed into the bed and closed her eyes. She needed to sleep as well.

"I love you, Madoka."

As she drifted off to sleep, she almost thought she could hear Madoka tiredly mutter, "…love you, too…"

* * *

"…So overall, my engineers want to cooperate in making a new fighter using your tech - only it can still launch from one of the tubes on a battlestar." Adama explained to the Captain. "All he's asking is your approval… but if you don't want too, I'll have him stow it."

"I've got an engineering crew that's bored out of their minds. Besides, we're travelling back to our universe; I think Starfleet Command will forgive me for giving you technology for fighters that might enter service in my universe when we get back. Tell Tyrol to expect Beta Team once you get back, Admiral." Ron handed a PADD to the Admiral, which included his authorization of the transfer. "President Roslin, I hope you don't have any problems?"

"None, though I have to wonder when we can at least restore some semblance of our original lives; civilization has to go on. I'll need help restoring—"

" _Bridge to Pinkerton: we got a problem._ "

Ron's head impacted his desk. "What is it, Takeshi; I'm in the middle of a meeting, here!"

" _Sensors are picking up odd energy readings,_ " Takeshi reported. " _They almost look like warp signatures and subspace anomalies, but that doesn't seem right._ "

"Take the _Firestorm_ and investigate: if it's hostile, kill it."

" _So… standard procedure?_ "

Ron smiled at the sound of his sister's voice. "Yes, Luna, standard procedure." It was a longstanding joke on the ship.

And the main reason everyone HATED the _Ra Cailum_.

" _Understood,_ " Takeshi replied. " _We'll let you know what we find. Yamato out._ "

"…Where were we?"

* * *

Sayaka aimlessly walked through the corridors of the _Ra Cailum_ , holding a dull gem in her hand. It just appeared during her walk through the corridor, and looked a LOT like the soul gems Mami, Homura and that redhead Kyoko had.

But she saw that big asshole do something that kept Kyubey from speaking to them, let alone contracting.

So she decided to get some advice. Mami was out of the question, what with her memory problems, while Homura would just shoot her.

So she picked option three: Kyoko Sakura.

Thankfully, finding her wasn't too difficult - she just visited ten forward where the 'Replicator' was. The girl was happily munching away on a box of chocolate pocky sticks.

"Hoi, blue!" The redhead grinned seeing her approach "This place is like a damn hotel, 'cept I don't have to pay rent!" Classic freeloader, but considering her implied past, that wasn't difficult to imagine.

"Sakura-san, mind if I talk with you?" Kyoko stopped chewing on the stick in her mouth at Sayaka's tone. This was serious. "Sure. And call me Kyoko."

"Ah… alright, Kyoko-san." Sayaka said, sitting down across from her. "I… feel like you're the only one I can trust with this, since Mami's memories are gone, and Homura… well..."

Kyoko rose an eyebrow "What?" She asked.

"I uhh… found… this," She pulled out the dull gem, presenting it to Kyoto - causing her to blink.

"Ok, soul gem. So?"

"I never contracted that bunny-cat ass Kyubey." She informed, "First time we met, Captain Pinkerton turned the little bastard into a plushy."

Kyoko paused before laughing. Loudly. For some reason, Sayaka liked it. "Ok, I'll be the first to say I like this guy already." She said, "Screwing over Kyubey is automatically an awesome thing to do." She pulled out a pocky stick, offering it to the bluenette. "Want one?"

Sayaka nodded, taking the stick and putting it in her mouth. "So… what should I do?" The girl asked, biting into the Pocky stick. "I mean… if this is like your soul gems, that means I…"

"Yeah, I know. Puella Magi." Kyoko's lips turned up into a smirk. "Hey, there's somewhere on board that can—"

"I watched _Star Trek_ , at least an episode or two of _The Next Generation_." She said, cutting her off "I know all about the holodecks, so I know what you're talking about. Maybe later: I have to go talk with Madoka and her family. I'm staying with them."

Kyoko looked downtrodden for a second. "I'm considering leaving their quarters, though," Sayaka said. "What about you?"

"Eh, they stuck me in one of the inner neck rooms," the redhead said. "I get a NICE view of the inside of the engineering section."

That was something Sayaka didn't really get. The _Ra Cailum_ had a split neck: it was hollow except for the struts connecting the saucer section to the engineering hull.

"Sounds nice… geez, this ship is so confusing," she groaned. "If it wasn't for the computer I'd probably have gotten lost _so_ many times…"

"Tell me about it. So, should I start moving things around? Don't got much in there, but…"

Sayaka shook her head. "Nope, didn't bring anything on board except the clothes on my back, so I'm good to go. I'll just have to tell Madoka and her parents I'm moving out!"

Kyoko's laugh sounded off again. "Look at you, all grown up!"

"Oh, shut up!"

* * *

 **USS _Firestorm_**

* * *

The escort was released from its' larger mothership before pulling an Ivan and heading towards the 'weirdness'. On board were several Colonial Marines, who were 'getting tired of waiting'.

"OK, let's see what new spatio-temporal weirdness we're in for today…" Takeshi remarked. "I swear, it's like all the crap that the _Enterprise_ doesn't deal with latches onto us!"

"No argument there," Luna replied.

Sergeant Mathias, de facto commander of the Marines from Pegasus, screwed her face up in confusion. "The frak are you people talking about? I thought this crap was normal for you people."

"Just because Starfleet deals with strangeness on a semi-regular basis, doesn't mean that it's the entire fleet that deals with it all the time," Takeshi remarked. "The strangeness always seems to congregate around specific ships, such as the _Ra Cailum_ , or Starfleet's flagship, the _Enterprise_."

"Doesn't help that we're the same class, does it?"

Takeshi froze. While the _Ra Cailum_ had an added 1500 tons thanks to the new secondary shuttlebay, the _Enterprise_ -F and the _Ra Cailum_ were both _Odyssey_ -class starships. And come to think of it, the previous _Ra Cailum_ was the same class as the previous _Enterprise_ \- _Sovereign_ -class starships.

"That makes a disturbing amount of sense," Takeshi said after a moment.

They were doomed by the simple fact that the _Ra Cailum_ was the _Enterprise_ 's sister. Takeshi's hopes of a normal life as long as he was on board were dashed.

As soon as they got home, he was going to transfer to another ship. He'd stick around with Ron - weird or not, the missions they went on were interesting, to say the least - but they would not be on the same ship.

Maybe one of those fancy _Mercury_ -class escorts…

"We're approaching the anomaly point," Kim announced, breaking Takeshi out of his thoughts.

"Right," Takeshi said. "Full sensors, Kim. I want to know what we're looking at here."

The tiny escort began sending out active sensor scans, before a rift in subspace began to visually form.

"Sir, I think I've seen this before…"

"I think you're right, this looks disturbingly familiar."

Out of the rift came a single vessel. Wedge-shaped, dark green hull, and bright glowing green portions.

"Oh, fuck," Takeshi breathed.

The ship turned and began opening fire, bright green crescent-shaped blasts speeding at the tiny escort, forcing Takeshi to go evasive.

"Rina, contact the _Ra Cailum!_ " Takeshi ordered, even as he began jockeying for an attack position. "Let Ron know we've got Elachi here!"

"On it!" Rina replied.

* * *

"Yes, Madam President, I know EXACTLY who to call to get a fleetwide economy running. If there's anything about the Ferengi I can trust, it's their ability to manage the economy."

The desk monitor began beeping, giving Ron a chance to take a break from the talk of dealing with the Colonials' many, MANY problems.

"Ronald Pinkerton, Asshole Supreme: how many I direct your call?"

" _Ron, it's Takeshi!_ " Takeshi replied, and Ron could tell the urgency in his voice. " _We've got a big problem! I'm currently engaged with an Elachi_ S'golth _-class escort - it was the source of the strange readings!_ "

"Oh, fuckery." Ron tapped his commbadge. "Red alert; all hands, stand to battle stations!"

"I'm assuming you know who these… Elachi are?" Roslin asked.

"Assholes who clearly hold a grudge against me and who make the Cylons look petty. Madam President, I'm going to have to forgo the Raptor and have you beamed directly back to _Colonial One_."

"Why? I'm not comfortable using that—"

"Get over it. Where the Elachi are, their masters aren't far behind. And against the Iconians, you would get slaughtered."

Roslin _would_ argue… but if the people who turned the Cylons ships into swiss cheese were being cautious about these 'Elachi', there must be a reason. She sighed "Very well," She said, "We'll stay out of this slugging match, Captain."

" _Boss, we got a problem_!"

"Never rains. WHAT?!"

" _Five baseships just jumped into weapons range, and they're launching Raiders_!" The captain groaned in annoyance. This was not his day.

"It appears you don't have a choice. We'll deal with the Elachi. You handle the Cylons."

* * *

Starbuck grinned as Mobius Squadron launched from the _Ra Cailum_ , joined by two additional flights of blueish fighters that she learned were called _Stalker_ -Class fighters. "Mobius, Starbuck: nice to see you joining the fight again."

" _We're not engaging the Cylons, Thrace: there's an Elachi ship on the way, and the Captain wants us on shuttle-interception duty._ "

"Fair enough," Starbuck said, their Vipers arcing forward towards the incoming attackers "Hurry up with that! I'll try and spare a few for you boys!"

"Copy that, Star—" Five full squadrons of Raiders vectored away from the fleet, heading for Mobius.

The Cylons had a plan, and clearly Mobius being occupied was part of it. "It's frakking suicide; those things are shielded!" Starbuck's eyes zeroed in on five boxy craft: Heavy Raiders.

"Oh FRAK!" She shouted, " _Ra-Cailum_ Actual, this is Starbuck! Heavy Raiders heading your way! They're trying to board you!"

" _They can't get through our shields, Starbuck—_ "

" _Corpsa, don't be an idiot; these people use jump drives! Security teams, stand by!_ " The three raiders disappeared in flashes of light, confirming Captain Pinkerton's comments. " _They're in the main shuttlebay! Starbuck, get those Raiders off my squadrons' asses!_ "

"Copy that, Pyramid! All Vipers, let's go kick some ass!" The Vipers soared ahead as they unleashed their cannonfire on the next incoming batch of Heavy Raiders, shredding them apart before they can jump inside the _Ra Cailum_.

Several broke off, heading for the rest of the fleet as the Elachi ship arrived on the coattails of the Firestorm.

They were mad. REALLY mad. Too bad for them the Colonials were more so.

* * *

Jaden had the basics: walking robots with big guns. He could handle that; with the help of the MACOs, who were like ODSTs mixed with spartans without the augments, they'd be off the ship in five minutes.

As the raiders put down, he could not have been more wrong.

There _were_ Centurions - the large chrome-plated machines were hard to miss… but among them were also various other aliens, some looking rather humanoid, while the others… they made Grunts look _pretty_.

And then they opened fire with energy weapons - and all hell broke loose.

"Son of a bitch; we got Elachi!" A purplish beam impacted Jaden's armor, draining his shields completely. "HERALDS!" A tall, eight-eyed being wielding some kind of staff rushed towards Jaden before it was quickly pummeled with phaser fire. "Spartan, stay on the Cylons; you're not equipped to deal with our kind of shit!" No shit, if it could down his shields, upgraded or not, in ONE SHOT.

"Goddamned bullshit this is!" Jaden shouted, as he opened fire on a supporting Centurion - the armor-piercing rounds shredded the Cylon armor from the inside out, riddling it up as the machine collapsed to the ground.

But the Centurions were a distraction, as were the Heralds, as some Elachi, like their Sectoid 'cousins', entered one of the jefferies tubes.

But this was the **_Ra Cailum_**. No matter where you went…

If you were an intruder, you _died_.

* * *

Mami Tomoe (she had yet to change her name to Pinkerton, although, from her own admission, her actual father's name WAS the same as Ron's) was on edge. While she lacked most of her father's abilities in combat, due to the fact that she wasn't trained by the walking talking apocalypse that was her father, she was VERY lethal.

As a dumb Elachi learned when she put a musket round into it. It didn't pen the shields, but it HURT. Sayaka tried to get a phaser, but that was impossible once she was grabbed by one of the shroom-heads and taken into the corridor, kicking and screaming.

And like father, like daughter, Mami wasn't going to let that happen. Too bad for her that Homura was faster as she stopped time briefly, pulled out her FN Minimi and took aim at the windows.

While they were transparent aluminium, they were just that: aluminium alloy. And she was packing 5.56x45mm armor-piercing incendiary rounds in that ammo belt.

She took as accurate as aim as hipfire could give her and opened fire just as time resumed.

At first the Elachi almost seemed smug - the Human seeming to miss it entirely. "You presume I was aiming at _you._ " The girl said, smirking slightly… before the Elachi heard the cracking behind it.

The human knew it was projectile-proof.

And she fired one more burst to ensure the window broke. Air was sucked out of the ship, sucking it towards the breach.

Homura stopped time again, straining herself to rescue Sayaka, who was shocked to see everything moving. Homura just dragged her along. "Hey, what the hell's going on—"

"Shut up, Miki. You'll understand in a moment." Time resumed, and both girls were pulled toward the breach, which the Elachi cleared. The air thinner than the maximum height on Everest, Homura thought she and Sayaka would die before the emergency containment fields kicked in, and compressed air from the reserve tanks recompressed the hallway.

Sayaka took a deep breath, clutching her chest "That… that was… close… " she muttered.

Screaming was heard a few halls down. While they didn't know who it was, they knew it was someone young and a girl.

And as the XO's quarters were in that direction, it could only be Larcei Yamato. The bluenette forced open a weapons locker, finding a standard phaser rifle and a type-2 pistol. While the rifle was a big big for her, the smaller phaser was perfect, and she took it out of the locker. "Come on, Akemi; we've got to save her!"

A purple vortex appeared, and out of it came five suits of armor, all without occupants, escorted by a Herald. Homura took aim with her LMG, used to no-win scenarios.

Fighting Walpurgisnacht for almost four centuries made her an expert.

* * *

While he hated the feel of them, Jaden had been forced to switch to a phaser rifle after one of those Herald thralls destroyed his DMR, forcing him to use Starfleet weapons. "I. Fucking. HATE. THESE. THINGS!" He shouted, as one Herald tried to get in close, only for Jaden to grab it by the neck and proceeded to smash its skull in. An Elachi tried to move behind him, but he used his free hand to blast its own face off.

"Keep it up!" One of the MACO soldiers shouted, firing on the enemies as they began to retreat. "They're falling back to the hangar!"

Jaden nodded, as he hopped from out of his cover as they continued the push. However as they advanced, they noticed something. Other Elachi and Heralds seemed to of taken prisoners, several officers of Starfleet were knocked out, being dragged onto the ship… and one screaming little girl.

The Spartan's blood ran cold. "LARCEI!" He shouted, as he sprinted forward. A Centurion stood between him and the enemies… but he just punched its face off. "OUT OF THE WAY, OUT OF MY FUCKING WAY!"

The Elachi not carrying anyone took aim at Jaden, firing their crescent wave disruptors at him, the first shot downing his shields and the remaining ones damaging his armor beyond any hope for UNSC engineers to repair, the final shot tearing his helmet apart. The Elachi predator that fired the final shot almost certainly mocked the Spartan as it boarded the Heavy Raider, Jaden unable to move thanks to the damage to his armor as the Raiders took off.

"GODDAMNIT LARCEI!" He shouted, struggling to stand back up as the Raiders took off, heading out of the hangar bay. He watched as they left - and as Mobius Squad prepared to fire.

"Nonono!" He slammed his commbadge that he was given "RON! DON'T SHOOT THE RAIDERS!"

" _What, they-_ "

"THEY HAVE LARCEI!"

"GET HER OUT OF THAT THING—" The boarding craft flashed away, the spatial distortions ripping duranium plating apart and sending parts flying, including parts of Jaden's now-ruined MJOLNIR suit.

One of the MACOs dropped her rifle. "They're gone."

"FIND THEM!"

* * *

The reports were coming in: damage to the _Ra Cailum_ was limited to the main shuttlebay and the single window homura shot out (Ron gave her points for quick thinking, but smacked her upside the head for shooting it out) while the fleet had taken one or two missiles that the military ships couldn't intercept.

But the biggest loss were 15 Starfleet officers and 32 civilians kidnapped from the superdreadnought.

One of whom was Larcei.

As Ron toured the sections of his ship that took hits, he was torn. Should he stay, and let them die and forced to become more Elachi, or should he attack and risk the lives of everyone in the civilian fleet?

"You want payback, don't you?" Ron didn't bother to face Roslin as he stood back up. "47 of my people are in enemy hands. The fuck you think I should do; nothing?!"

"I fully understand what you want," Roslin said. "You want to get them back… I'm not saying you should do nothing, but we can't go charging on ahead. We need to figure out what we're really up against… the Cylons are working with these Elachi, that makes them just as much of an enemy to us, as they are to you now."

"I can't let them stay on that damned chamber of horrors, but I can't risk almost half a million lives to rescue 47 people. I am not making the choice between the needs of the many and the needs of the few."

The ship rocked, and Roslin hit the portside bulkhead, falling to her knees. "What was that?" "If I knew, Madam President—"

" _Bridge to Captain! You better get up here! We got interesting things going on!_ "

The captain extended a hand to Roslin, getting her to her feet. "Let's find out, shall we?"

"Yes. Yes, we should, Captain."

* * *

Takeshi and Luna stood in their quarters, which had been trashed by the boarders. Tables, chairs, and Larcei's toys were strewn everywhere, many of them in pieces. The only thing still in place was their bed, being bolted down, but the mattress, pillows, and sheets were all askew

"I… I don't believe it…" Luna whispered. "Why… why would they take Larcei…?"

"I don't know," Takeshi replied. "We'll get her back, though - I know we will."

Larcei was no threat. She was too young and thus small for conversion into an Elachi; if anything, their little girl should have been shot, leaving a little corpse in the morgue, not one who was missing.

But they knew who commanded the Elachi now. As such, it started making more sense.

T'ket wanted them to suffer. She wanted them to know pain. She had forgotten who she was screwing with.

"We'll get her back," Takeshi said again. "T'ket picked the wrong child to abduct. We won't let this stand."

The ship rocked from something affecting space, nearly sending them to their asses. "Now what?!"

"We should get to the bridge; my brother's probably about to open a can of doom on the next bunch of idiots taking potshots at us."

* * *

Sonja stood on the bridge, Takeshi and Luna more occupied with moping then with their jobs, so she had to take command.

She was used to it. But not to this.

The turbolift doors opened, allowing Ron and Roslin to enter the bridge. "Report."

"An interphasic rift formed about 400 kilometers to port, and they just came out of it."

"Who's they?" Ron asked, as he looked out the main screen… before spotting multiple vessels emerging from the rift, all bearing a design he was very familiar with. "…Fucking _Tholians?_ "

"Tholians?"

"Crystalline lifeforms; insanely paranoid and can only live on planets whose temperature exceeds 500 degrees. And they don't like the Federation. Red alert!"

Corpsa prepared for combat until the comm beeped. "We're being hailed by the Tholian flagship." Ron quirked an eyebrow, but walked to his chair. "On screen."

The screen showed the image of the Tholian commander, an atypical crystal with legs and pincer arms. " _Pinkerton-Captain, I am Akel of the Tholian Assembly._ "

"Clearly I don't need to introduce myself. What do you want?"

" _I will get to the point,_ " the Tholian said. " _First, you have developed the universal drive technology. You are to be congratulated for stepping into a larger existence. Second, we observed your battle with the Iconian servants._ "

Ron was less than amused. "Did you come to gloat?"

" _No, on the contrary,_ " Akel informed. " _We have come here to repay a debt to you, Pinkerton-Captain. We shall help you fight the Iconians in this universe._ "

"…the fuck?"

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: Tholian surprise, motherfuckers. (looks at T6 _Sovereign_ page) SON OF A BITCH! THEY ADDED A CLOAK TO THE T6 _SOVEREIGN_! BASTARDS RIPPED FROM ME!**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Yeah, the Tholians are here now! I heard it theorized once that the Tholians are a multiversal empire, with their true home being in some kind of dimensional nexus/hub, so I felt we could exploit that in this story. Expect to see them pop up in plenty of the stops in our journey.**

 **117Jorn: The question now is… can they help save Larcei? Find out next week on STAR TREK ODYSSEY!**


	17. Chapter 17

**Time/Date: circa 150,000 BCE**

 **Location: Delta Quadrant**

* * *

While Larcei had never been on another starship, she was very curious as to why the Elachi had to have such dark halls and colors. It was nothing like the Ra Cailum, which had a sort of happy, warm interior.

This was horrifying and disgusting. She would have to take a sonic shower for weeks, she figured, to wash the smell off of her.

"God, T'ket, WHY does this ship have to smell so bad?! It feels like my eyes are melting!"

"Do not complain, Cavil; you should be grateful that I am giving you any technological assistance at all."

Larcei's eyes opened, realizing she was in some kind of tube. Just outside she could see two figures. One looked like a human, but the other… wasn't that the big mean thing her Uncle fought a while ago?

"I _am_ greatful, T'ket, don't get me wrong," the human - Cavil - said. "It's just an annoyance is all… but if it helps us kill Colonials, I'll deal with it."

"As soon as we are finished with them, we will hand over the bodies to the Elachi. Your servants have a very effective way of adding to their numbers."

"I will be keeping one of them alive. The Other will suffer his blood's loss to me." And that meant that the big mean thing was going to keep her here.

Well, her father and uncle drilled one thing into her head: if someone wanted to keep you against your will… You make them pay for it.

In blood. Thankfully, the big robots and the shroom-heads were so dumb, they didn't even check her for weapons. Uncle Ron would be disappointed with them.

When the two figures left, Larcei pulled out the knife Jaden had given her. She looked around and saw a small opening where the tube was opened and closed, and she worked the knife inside. She began to jiggle it further and further, using it as a fulcrum before giving it one strong push with all her strength.

Suddenly, the tube hissed open - and Larcei fell outside and onto the deck. She panted slightly, before picking the knife up again. She smiled looking at it ' _Thank you Jaden-Niisan…._ ' she thought, before looking around - noticing the other captives in similar tubes. She quickly got to work - and tried to free as many as she could before more Shrooms showed up.

* * *

 **USS Ra Cailum - War Room**

* * *

Originally a small storage locker (although on an _Oddy_ , small meant the size of large bedroom) the war room was used for tactical operations planning. In there was Ron, Captain Drake, who was de facto commander of the UNSC forces, Admirals Adama and Urei, and Commander Akel of the Tholian Assembly.

Who was weirding the fuck out of the Colonials, who had never met an alien before, and had just had their _second_ first contact in one day. "May I ask WHY you want to help us, Commander? To the best of my knowledge, you have no reason to really do so."

"Some within the Assembly would agree with you," Akel informed - wearing the Tholian exosuit. "However… we still remember the debt we owe you for Akati Minor and Tholia."

Ron thought about it for a moment, before he recalled what he meant. "The Iconian attack."

"Correct," Akel nodded. "You and your ship saved one of our colonies… we owe a debt to you, Pinkerton, and we intend to repay it in kind."

"Sounds like the Tholians like you."

"More like they fear me; I've been called the ultimate fusion of Borg technology and human ingenuity by the Klingons more than once, because I can do what the Borg do… but they can't adapt to me like they can to the Borg: I'm too random for that." Ron shook his head "Point is, we need to blitzkrieg these bastards. Get in, beat the ship out of them, get our people and wormhole out."

"The Tholian forces will engage the Elachi." The exo-suit-covered Akel gestured to the triangular Elachi ships on the table-monitor. "Your allies are not equipped to deal with them."

Adama pointed at the Cylon ships on the screen, still unnerved about the alien in the superheated suit. "We'll take care of the Cylons. A little payback never hurt."

"Do as you wish," Akel said, "We are here to aid Pinkerton-Captain. Now we must set out a plan of attack."

"The _Ra Cailum_ will warp in, hitting the Elachi as hard as possible before diverting to the Iconian forces; they're the bigger threat," Ron informed. "The UNSC forces will support the Colonials and the Tholians in attacking the Cylons and the remaining Elachi ships while Colonial, UNSC, XCOM, and Starfleet boarding parties board the captive ship, rescue our people and blow it to hell. Remember, this is the basic outline; no plan ever survives first contact with the enemy, so prepare to improvise." Ron cast a rueful look at Akel. "Something the Tholians have… difficulty doing."

"Your assessment, if insulting, is accurate; we do not have the ability to 'think on our feet', as you humans would call it."

"Thankfully, that's something we do fairly well," Drake said, nodding. "Just give the word, Captain."

"Given. Return to your ships, people: we march to war once more."

* * *

 **Elachi prison ship**

* * *

Larcei lost her friends, who tried to sabotage the ship to make their rescue easier, in the jefferies tubes. She resisted coughing as much as she could until she couldn't any more, coughing loudly.

This was a mistake. "Well, well, what do we have here?" A bony hand grabbed the back of her shirt, lifting her to eye level with the man who called himself Cavil.

"A little escapee…" Cavil smirked, "You know… it's so easy killing humans, you know? No armor plating, no circuits… Sometimes I wish I never was stuck in this human body… " he grabbed her by the neck. "…it's so… _weak_ …"

Larcei struggled as he began to choke her… but what he didn't notice was her reaching her hand behind her back. "I'm sure T'Ket won't mind if I kill you… what's one human-"

Suddenly Larcei pulled out the Knife, and proceeded to lodge it inside Cavil's eye socket.

The Cylon gagged as he dropped the girl, attempting to pull out the knife before the damage to his brain forced him to slam his head into the bulkhead, shoving the knife deeper into his head.

Cavil fell down, dead, back on the floor. While she wasn't a cold-hearted person, Larcei didn't want to leave the knife behind.

Besides, Uncle Ron and tou-san taught her that if someone mean was trying to hurt you, you didn't show much respect to them before you hurt them. So she simply tugged the knife out of Cavil's skull.

Once she retrieved the knife, she continued making her way through the ship. She needed to find a way out, in case her parents couldn't reach her…

* * *

 **Battlestar Galactica**

* * *

Tyrol watched as Starfleet's people modified their Vipers and Raptors with 'phaser cannons' and 'photon missile' launchers, as well as shield generators. "You sure they'll survive the shit they'll have thrown at them."

The green-skinned 'Orion', Mitod, scoffed. "I had to put in a few power cells, but they'll survive anything up to a _Peregrine_ shooting at them," she said. "They can take on a baseship if the pilot was crazy enough."

"Dibs!" Mitod blinked as Starbuck hopped inside the cockpit of one of the upgraded Mark-II vipers.

"…well, if she wants it," Mitod said as she shrugged, looking through her PADD. "We'll get them up to spec within the hour hopefully… need to hurry this up, I got another big project on the ship I gotta do."

"Like what?"

"One of our guests lost his powered armor, and me and Sonja are busy working on making an upgraded version, using tritanium/duranium alloys and some of our most advanced technologies. I think they'll like it." That was an understatement: the MJOLNIR-VB was good, in some ways more advanced than the MACO semi-powered armor, but inferior in many more ways, as they were less durable, their shields were only one-one hundredth as powerful, and needlessly heavy, as the suit weighed over a ton.

The new model, called the Mk-5C, weighed less than 150 kilos, had twice the physical strength of the VB, the shields were on par with Starfleet standards and, finally, was made of tritanium/duranium-electroceramic composites, which were more durable than the titanium-A used in the last model.

Mitod prized it as her greatest work so far, and hoped the Spartan she was giving it to agreed. "The others will finish up here," she said. "I've got other work to do."

Tyrol just waved her off. The crew of that ship were INSANE.

But they were the GOOD kind of fraking crazy. The kind they needed.

* * *

Jaden held the remains of his helmet. The suit was almost completely destroyed by those jackasses with the purple beams, which he was told were antiproton beams.

So, while it pissed him off, it made sense.

After all, his shields weren't designed to deal with _ANTIMATTER_ particle beams.

Though that wasn't exactly what he was thinking about. His thoughts were still on Larcei, the image of her screaming, helplessly as she was carried away on the Raider wouldn't leave him alone. ' _…I can't even keep a little girl safe…_ ' he thought, looking at the armor. ' _…some Spartan I am…_ '

He stared at the helmet for a while, before growling as he tossed it against the wall. "FUCK!" He shouted, as he punched one of the lockers, forming a dent.

"You know the boss isn't going to be happy about that." Jaden sharply turned around to look at the Orion engineer, who looked mildly amused.

"I don't CARE what your captain thinks right now."

"Who says I was talking about that sexy ex-borg? I was talking about my equally sexy chief engineer. Besides, I got something for you. You might like it."

Jaden had no idea why the woman considered Ron sexy; he had what was considered a small beer gut, for God's sake. But she'd indulge her. "What is it?" He asked, sitting back down.

She simply handed him a PADD, which he looked at. It displayed a VERY upgraded version of Jaden's old MJOLNIR-V armor, which Starfleet-grade shields and materials. ONI would DROOL having this in their hands. "What's this?"

"Your new suit; the boss and I decided to work on an upgraded model." Mitod smiled, "In some ways, it was better than our MACO semi-powered armor suits: enhanced physical strength, better modular construction and better tactical displays. The downsides…well, the fucking thing weighs a literal metric ton, the titanium-A is like tissue paper to weapons we encounter and the shields suck equally as well." He took the good with the bad; after all, she admitted that their suits weren't superior in all respects. Just the ones that increased your chances of not dying from a direct hit.

"Wait a second, you couldn't've been making this thing today, I just lost—"

"We've been working on it since we got our hands on that suit of yours at Reach." She informed, "And since you joined the party, so to speak, we've been working on building it in our spare time: 80% of the parts were ready when we left the last universe. Now… we're speeding up construction."

The Orion then sat down next to Jaden "Look… I know you're beating yourself up over Larcei," she said, "But first of all, it's not your fault what happened. And second: she may not be dead yet. We have a chance to get her back - get them _all_ back… and we're going to take it."

Jaden was silent, looking at the PADD, before he felt Mitod put a hand on his shoulder. "We're gonna get her back, alright?" she said assuringly. "Her and everyone else… Larcei will survive." She smiled slightly. "She's had _you_ as her teacher, remember?"

The Spartan chuckled bitterly. "Yeah… I am…" he said. "How soon?"

"End of the day, it'll be ready," Mitod said, as she stood up. "Just hang in there, Jaden… " she paused for a moment, before she sighed. "Ah hell with it," she then gave the Spartan a quick kiss, stunning him. "That's for luck." She winked before she headed out of the armory, leaving a rather stunned Jaden.

* * *

Ron walked onto the bridge, wearing his modified MACO-issue battle armor in place of his uniform.

The crew KNEW that was a bad sign. He NEVER wore armor; his personal shields were so overpowered he didn't need it. This was a sign he wanted to rip T'ket's head off her shoulders. With his bare hands.

"Report."

"All military ships are ready to engage, Captain. The Tholians were kind enough to leave a force to defend the civilian ships so we can focus on the attack."

Ron sat down in his chair, gesturing to the screen. "Cassie, open a channel to the fleet."

Cassie nodded "Aye aye, channel open." She informed.

"This is Commodore Ronald Pinkerton. Recently, 50 of our people were captured by the Elachi and the Cylons. I do not leave people in the hands of the enemy. I also do not let them get AWAY with it. We will get our people back. And we will make them REGRET it. All personnel, STAND TO BATTLE STATIONS!" Alarms began going off as the Ra Cailum turned toward the known location of the Elachi/Cylon staging point, jumping to maximum warp, the Tholians following a moment later.

T'ket declared war on the _Ra Cailum_.

She clearly didn't remember that the last time she did, she LOST.

* * *

 **HA Anderson: Well, you know what time it is!**

 **Takeshi Yamato: That we do. *The word RAPE appears in big white letters***

 **Ron the True Fan: The Ra Cailum's second registry. T'ket's about to learn the meaning of 'mistake'.**

 **117Jorn: Mistake? More along the lines of "You done F**ked up." Next time, the _Ra Cailum_ and their new allies take the fight to the Iconian B***h. Until next time…**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**


	18. Chapter 18

**Time/Date: circa 150,000 BCE**

 **Location: Delta Quadrant**

* * *

50 baseships were escorted by a fleet of 20 Elachi S'golth destroyers and a pair of Monbosh-Class battleships, as well as a collection of Iconian Baltim raiders, a _Quas_ -Class cruiser and a single Iaidon dreadnought. The latter was a new arrival.

And flagship of T'ket, who was thinking: remembering the past. How Takeshi Yamato and his captain, the Other, murdered her sister, M'tara. How when Kahless failed, Riza Pinkerton succeeded in taking off her arm. She intended to take her revenge on Takeshi's daughter, Larcei, but the little girl was as crafty as her uncle and parents. She escaped, along with a number of other captives… but they were hunting them all now. It would only be a matter of time before they are found.

She glanced at the stub where her arm once was, growling slightly. They would pay, _all_ of them would pay for what they did to her, to M'tara… she would not rest until they do.

* * *

The Cylons were feeling nice and secure. They had a big fraking fleet and T'ket had VERY powerful ships.

That confidence was… ill-placed, proven as a grey starship just dropped out of quantum slipstream, unleashing phaser barrages on the baseships, reducing 12 of them to slag instantly.

(BGM: Ghost Division by Sabaton)

" _Hey T'ket! Guess what?! I'M BACK! You want me, you Iconian bitch?! COME AND FUCKING GET ME!_ "

The Elachi ships moved out of position - moving to engage the Starfleet vessel as it continued its attack. The Iconian ships followed suit, lead by the dreadnought itself with one enraged Iconian. "YOU WILL DIE HERE PINKERTON!" T'Ket roared. "ALL OF YOU WILL PAY!"

" _Come and fucking get me, then!_ "

" _You heard the boss, Kety! Come and get us_!"

If the Iconian wasn't being an idiot, she would have noticed something wrong.

The _Firestorm_ was gone, missing from its' docking port. And when the rest of the fleet arrived, she had too much to worry about, as the Tholians engaged the Elachi and the rest engaged the Cylons after jumping in.

* * *

"This is insane! What the hell was the boss thinking with this plan?!"

"He was thinking we'd get a chance to slip in and save everyone while the enemies are distracted," Takeshi remarked. "That way, once we get them clear, we're free to Maxim 37 these idiots."

"…uhh… Maxim 37?"

"There is no 'overkill'," Takeshi stated. "There is only 'open fire' and 'I need to reload'."

"I don't think the captain believes in that."

A baseship exploded as Ron shoved a photon torpedo into it, which was far more than what was needed to destroy it.

"I don't think he CARES right now, Kim."

"Right, I forgot; he's MAD. Mad equals everything dies!"

Luna shook her head in aggravation. "What he's doing is drawing them out of position. He might want to kill them, but that's a bonus! Let's find that Elachi ship and get our people back."

The plan was for the _Firestorm_ to search for the captive ship, disable it and signal the assault Raptors, shuttles and Pelicans to board it, find the captives and kill everything else while they rescued them.

And so far, the plan seemed to be working.

"Anything yet, Kim?" Takeshi asked.

"Elachi shields are designed to screw with our sensors; I can't pick up anything." A phaser beam impacted the shields of a S'golth, draining them briefly, enough for the Firestorm to pick up a scan of the inside.

"Thank the Captain later: he hit the captive ship! 47 non-Elachi lifesigns on board!"

"Alright, let's do it!" Takeshi replied, as the cloak dropped and the _Firestorm_ opened fire, aiming to disable the Elachi ship.

Phaser pulses left the ship's forward emitters, impacting the rear section of the Elachi ship, the shields flaring green for a brief moment before they were overwhelmed, and the engines hit, sending the ship adrift before a torpedo impacted the shield generator. "They're disabled!"

"Signal Ron!" Takeshi ordered. "The way is cleared for the shuttles and dropships! Brok'tan, you have the bridge! Luna, you're with me - let's get our daughter back!"

* * *

Jaden sat in the back of a Pelican, modified with shields and a pair of heavy phaser cannons in the nose as well as a phaser minigun in the rear. Inside with him was the entirety of Alpha Squad and several ODST's and the other Spartan's among the UNSC. He inspected the new rifle, which was custom-made by Starfleet. It was a MA5-series rifle, however modified with a unique receiver which could accept standard MA5 rifle clips, or could be exchanged for a power source for the built-in phaser attachment. It wasn't perfect… but he liked it.

"You know the mission." Colonel Kelly said, looking at everyone. "We're getting our people back. If it's not wearing one of our uniforms, you shoot it. Understood?"

"Sir, Yes Sir!"

One of the Raptors jumped away, before the hangar bay doors exploded outwards, allowing them to enter, Starfleet shuttles leading the way, followed by Jaden's Pelican. The rear doors opened, and he was the first one out the door.

He jumped out of the Pelican, crushing an Elachi as he landed, killing it. It was just one of many he had to kill to get to Larcei. And he was going to be killing a LOT of Elachi to get to that little girl.

The Spartan whirled out a pair of SMG's and unloaded them into the Elachi warriors - cutting through their shields and armor of the xeno's, as he made a mad dash forward - an unfortunate Elachi tried to stop him by standing in his way… Jaden dropped his guns and ripped the alien in half.

Literally.

The remaining Elachi ran from the Spartan, retreating deeper into their ship to avoid getting killed.

They would not get far. When a Spartan is on a mission, they complete it. No matter the cost.

* * *

Starbuck rolled the newly refit Viper over, unleashing a short burst of nadion energy into the Mir fighter that was chasing Mobius Seven. "Thanks, Starbuck."

"Not a problem, Seven!" A raider fired its' 30mm cannons at the Peregrine, pinging of the shields harmlessly before Seven vaporized it using one of the heavy fighter's phaser arrays.

Starbuck smirked as she rolled the Viper VIII left - relishing in the newfound mobility of the interceptor. The thing handled like a dream, keeping up with her reaction time and performed _beautifully_ against the Cylon Raiders, and held its own against the Elachi craft.

The Iconian ones, on the other hand...

A black and purple beam impacted the rear end of her Viper, draining the shields as a Mir fighter chased her down.

The Colonial pilot hit the reversers, the Iconian fighter overshooting and falling squarely into her gunsights before she pulled trigger, the phaser cannons pounding the rear end of the Mir before an Oschu nearly lanced through her Viper with its' disruptors. This illustrated shielded combat fighter design: large, warp-capable fighters with their own reactors could hold their own against starships. The Viper was just too small to serve as anything but a short-range point-defense fighter.

The Oschu was double-teamed by a pair of Tholian Widow Fighters, and promptly turned into a fireball.

"I need to get me one of those!"

" _Starbuck,_ Ra Cailum _: trust me, you can't fly one. If you climbed into the cockpit, you'd fry in seconds._ "

"Do you HAVE to ruin my day, Captain?!"

" _Trust me, it's what he was born for._ "

Starbuck sighed, as she fell back briefly so her shields could recharge.

Still, with the added power of the _Peregrines_ , _Stalkers_ , and the Tholians, this was less of a bitch.

* * *

"Riza, target the Iconian dreadnought; bring us in on their stern."

"And what about the idiots that get in the way, nii-sama?"

"We use their corpses as a battering ram to kill T'ket with!"

"Understood!" The _Ra Cailum_ began moving, firing on anything hostile that tried to get between them and the dreadnought.

A pair of raiders fired on the _Ra Cailum_ , but a well-timed tractor pulse sent them flying into another Elachi ship. "Oops. Did we do that?"

A baseship fired nuclear missiles at the dreadnought before a series of 600cm shells slammed into the starfish-shaped ship, fired from _Galactica_. "We'll keep the Cylons off your back, Captain."

"Much-obliged, _Galactica_ Actual! Hey, T'ket! Enjoying losing again?!"

There was no audio reply, but the enemy ship sent a barrage of fire at the _Ra Cailum_.

"She hates you."

"Riza, EVERYONE hates me. Mostly because they don't take the time to get to know me."

"No, because you're a universal asshole. You're just nice when it suits you and when you don't want people to shove a knife in your back. Practically impenetrable shields or not."

"…true, but not the time for debate."

The dreadnought snap-turned, a turn that few pilots could do on on an _Oddy_ , with Takeshi and Tom Paris on that list.

But Riza? She made them look like washouts.

* * *

Alpha Squad marched further into the base, their plasma weapons at the ready. They had split up from Jaden's team to cover more ground in the station to look for their people - more importantly Larcei. "Stay frosty," The Colonel warned, as they kept their weapons up. "We got the briefing on these freaks, keep an eye out."

Annette kept her shotgun ready, her eyes darting around them - however she saw movement ahead, and acted immediately "INCOMING!" She shouted, her eyes and hands flaring with psionic energy as she formed a telekinetic field before them - the Elachi soldiers opened fire - but their weapons fire diminished in the fields dampening effects.

"Good work Annette!" The Colonel shouted, as he and the team took cover behind the bulkheads with the time their Psionic operative gave them. "Light 'em up!"

The XCOM operatives opened fire, the Elachi shields holding their 5.56 rounds back until the new shield disruptor rounds took them down long enough for the bullets to pen and kill the Elachi. All of their firearms had been modified with the newly-developed rounds, as the XCOM people didn't want to throw their guns away.

That, and Sonja was developing them in the first place: the Covenant and Ethereals gave her some material to FINALLY finish development of the bullets, and even some variants. Like the incendiary rounds Kelly was using to set an Elachi on fire.

"I fucking LOVE Henderson!" Zhang shouted, aiming his fist forward before it launched out as a Rocket Fist - hitting an Elachi soldier in the head - firing the heavy phaser cannon with his remaining arm as the fist traveled back. "She and Shen are a fucking _dangerous_ combination!"

Thuds were heard from down the hall. Familiar ones as a hulking tower of muscle they all knew entered sight. "Where the fuck? A muton?!" The armor was replaced, and more cybernetics were added, but it was a muton, carrying a heavy disruptor cannon.

And while they had better guns, they DIDN'T have personal shields.

Sonja hadn't had the time to install them.

"DUCK AND COVER!" Kelly shouted, as the Muton unloaded with the Disruptor cannon, forcing them back into cover. "FUCK! I Thought we were finished with these jackasses!" He looked at Selina Wolfe "Contact the big man! T'Ket has new friends!"

The Heavy weapons specialist nodded, pulling out her comm. "Alpha Squad to _Ra Cailum_ actual, we've got a problem here!"

"Ra Cailum _actual to Alpha - what's the problem?_ "

"That T'Ket bitch has more friends than the Cylons!" Selina said, ducking as a disruptor bolt passed by. "We've engaged some upgraded Muton!"

" _Lovely. That means she either visited your universe, or they ended up in her hands somehow. Anything else?_ "

"Just the Muton, but there's probably more shit on board, Captain!" she warned. "If they've upgraded Mutons, who knows what else might be onboard. Any chances for more reinforcements?"

" _That'd be a no, Alpha: we're kinda busy dealing with an Iconian superdreadnought. If it makes you feel better, you can take their guns. Unlike the Ethereals, the Elachi and Iconians leave their junk intact when their users die._ "

Kelly froze in his cover. Right before he began laughing. Kill the muton, get a bigger, badder gun?

THAT he could get on board with.

"Zhang! ARC Gun!" he shouted. "Selina, Solomon, Suppressive fire! Everyone else: FIRE EVERYTHING!"

And that was exactly what they did, as the Heavy and Grenadier of Alpha unloaded their weapons towards the Muton - as its supporting Elachi were gunned down by weapons fire. The Muton growled as it took aim with its Disruptor again - however Zhang acted quicker, popping from behind his cover - his MEC's main weapon charged before a bolt of white energy shot out - hitting the oversized alien in the head… and blasting it clean off.

The muscle-bound alien hit the deck, leaving its' REALLY big gun. Kelly laughed manically for a few seconds before picking up the deceptively light weapon.

"So, who thinks we're going to have a LOT of fancy guns by the end of this?" Alpha Squad smirked in response. They didn't need to worry about capturing the aliens.

Just kill them. The way it should've been from the start.

* * *

Jaden reloaded his MA37, preferring the older 7.62mm rounds to Sonja's new shield disruptors. He thought they lacked the punch of the UNSC-standard ammo.

He was wrong, but he didn't know that.

Though he wasn't going to need them against what he was about to run into as plasma, not disruptor fire, hit the wall beside him.

"Shit!" Jaden shouted, skidding to a halt before whirling around towards the source, before blinking as he saw what looked like Ethereal Sectoids - only with a series of cybernetic augmentations built into them as they fired at him. If he was wearing his old armor, he would've taken cover from the strikes… instead, the plasma just hit across his shields, dealing only minimal damage… but he didn't notice as he charged forward - his knife in hand as he roared in challenge against the aliens. He jumped on the first Sectoid - stabbing his Kukri into its skull, killing it instantly. He aimed his left hand towards the second alien, unloading the full clip inside its brains.

He tossed the empty rifle into the third Sectoid - knocking it back, which bought Jaden the time to deliver a SPARTAN Kick into its torso, sending it flying back against the wall - the sheer force of the kick combined with his own strength and the amplifications of the armor practically turned it into putty.

"Spartan B312 to _Ra Cailum_ : We've got sectoids on board."

" _We know: Alpha team just ran into a Muton. T'ket's upgraded her forces. I guess we made them mad._ "

"Captain, from our limited time together, I've discovered that's your JOB."

" _Only to people trying to kill me. Find Larcei as quickly as possible, Spartan. Pinkerton out._ "

Jaden picked his rifle back up, before going back to dashing through the halls, looking for the young girl. He wasn't leaving this place until he found her. _Alive_.

* * *

Homura reloaded her Type 89 rifle using the new shield buster rounds Sonja developed. While they were effective, she didn't exactly see why she had to be here. Madoka was still on board the _Ra Cailum_ , so she should be there to protect her.

A roar was heard behind the ravenette before what she could only refer to as Doom Rejects with jetpacks flew into her view, carrying plasma rifles - aaaand firing them at her. Of course. Homura just rolled her eyes, easily dodging the plasma fire with a few jumps before flying over the 'Elachi' she was told they were called - and unloaded her rifle into the back of the hideous alien - shredding it in half as it fell to the deck dead in pieces.

"Pathetic." The ravenette reloaded her rifle, before several Gray-type aliens exited another room, blinking their bulbous eyes. ' _I thought the Elachi were all the same._ ' two much taller aliens, with mushroom-like heads and some form of containment suit, exited as well, pointing more advanced weapons at her. They opened fire, forcing her to stop time to dodge the crescent-shaped energy bolts.

She withdrew a Minimi built by the Japanese before opening fire in a long burst before the weapon suffered something she loathed. The FN Minimis built by the Japanese suffered a slight problem, and that was they were not built to standard. As such, they malfunctioned often, such as the hangfire her LMG suffered.

She bit back a curse, before deciding 'fuck it' before she pulled out an AT4 missile launcher, and shot at the hoard of aliens coming her way - the anti-tank weapon hitting one of the larger creatures in the head, and the explosion ripping itself and any aliens around it into pieces. Discarding the used launcher, she pulled out another Minimi as she continued on deeper into the station, keeping her eye out for the little girl she was told about.

" _This is Colonel Kelly: Ethereal forces sighted on board! We just ran into a Muton!_ "

Homura tapped the earpiece given to her by Sonja. "This is Akemi. Are there aliens with jetpacks?"

" _Shit. You ran into Floaters. Be careful Akemi: those things are hard to hit._ "

The former Puella Magi hmmed. "Hard to hit for you, perhaps." She walked on, her heels clicking on the deck plating. The only reason she was here was because Madoka asked her.

She should have refused.

* * *

Larcei had continued running through the ship, still unable to find an escape pod or a transporter or anything she could use to escape. The shuddering of the ship told her that her parents were there to rescue her.

Two Elachi ran through the corridor in front of her, and she had to keep moving. That changed her fate as she entered a room with a massive arch. Her uncle told her about one of these things, calling it an Iconian gateway. And she knew it was dangerous.

"Well, well, look what I found." A gun was cocked as Larcei looked behind her, finding a man in a suit. Cavil called him Doral. He was a mean man.

"The little girl T'ket wants so badly. Too bad." He pointed the gun at her head. "Because you're going to die today." The ship rocked, sending Doral to his rear end, the gun discharging and hitting one of the power conduits.

This had an adverse effect. It activated the gateway.

Only it didn't activate normally - rather than opening a portal to some unknown destination, it opened up as a vortex, and began sucking everything in. Larcei grabbed hold of a railing, but her feet were lifted into the air as the vortex pulled at her, and she knew she couldn't hold her grip for long.

She was going to die. And she knew it.

This was the sight Jaden, Takeshi and Luna saw as they blasted open the doors. "LARCEI!" All three of them shouted at once.

"J-Jaden-nii!" Larcei called back, holding onto the railing for dear life. "Tou-san! Kaa-san! HELP!"

Jaden didn't even think - leaping forward as he grabbed onto the railing - activating his magboots keeping him down as he walked as close to the girl as possible. "Hang on Larcei!" he called back. "Don't let go!"

"I-I'm trying!" she called. "I-I can't-" There was a creak as the railing began to give way. "HELP! HURRY!"

' _MovemovemoveMOVE!_ ' He thought as he tried to move faster - but a chunk of the railing gave away - forming a gap between him and her. "Oh for FUCK'S SAKE!" He grabbed his side of the catwalk, before using his free hand reaching out towards Larcei "LARCEI! GRAB MY HAND!"

Larcei tried to reach, but her side of the railing swung out - and the new angle of her grip meant that she slid down it before being pulled free, screaming as she was sucked into the vortex.

"LARCEI!" Jaden shouted, letting go of the railing - letting the vortex suck him forward - hoping he could reach her before she passed through.

"JADEN!" Larcei cried, before she was sucked into the portal… before the portal shut off - sending out a shockwave which sent Jaden flying backwards against the wall.

"LARCEI! NO!" Luna cried out as she watched her daugher vanish. Takeshi just stood there, gazing at where she'd been, unable to say anything.

Jaden slid down from the wall, collapsing to the ground, unmoving. It wasn't that he couldn't… he just, stopped. The image of Larcei's terrified face still fresh in his mind. ' _I… I failed… again…_ ' he thought. ' _Noble… Eclipse… Larcei…_ '

The parents watched as the gate fell to pieces. "Contact Ron," a member of the team who had just arrived said. "Get Sonja over here; if she can repair the gate, we can find out where she went!"

It was a reasonable plan, but Takeshi was too shocked to speak, let alone move.

They lost her.

* * *

The Quas retreated, not prepared for the _Ra Cailum's_ relentless chase as Galactica and Pegasus pounded the shit out of another baseship.

"Vent Plasma!" Ron shouted as the _Ra Cailum_ vented out warp plasma in front of an Elachi battleship. The rear quantum torpedoes fired into the mess, resulting in a massive explosion which detonated the entire warship. "Target the next battleship! The bitch dies NOW!"

"Ron, message from the away…" Cassie began to say, before her eyes widened. "…Oh no…"

"What?!"

"Ron…" Cassie muttered, "it's… Larcei they… there was a Gateway and… they… lost…"

"What?"

"She's gone."

Ron leaned back in his chair. His niece, his blood, was dead.

In his mind, a dam broke. Sonja didn't need to push The Button any more.

Larcei just did.

"All power to weapons." He snarled out, "Use the deflector to channel chronoton particles into the phasers. I want that Iconian cunt to PAY FOR MURDERING MY NIECE!"

Riza's eyes narrowed. "Aye… Nii-sama," she growled, before slamming the controls forward. Outside the ship, it looked as if the _Ra Cailum_ soared forward - firing its weapons.

ALL. OF. THEM.

The _Ra Cailum_ unleashed a wave of death and destruction the Federation hadn't seen since Wolf 359 and Chin'toka. Only this time… _they_ were the Borg and the Breen.

The Iaidon began to break up, the radiation soaking into the hull, Heralds dying as the ship opened a gateway.

T'ket was fucked, and even in her insanity, this made that PLAINLY clear.

The ship escaped, followed by what few ships could follow: two baseships, a badly damaged Quas.

They were not going to put up a fight. But it was over. They reclaimed 46 people.

But lost one little girl.

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: …wow…**

 **Ron the True Fan: T'ket's gone, but so's Larcei. And Ron's not happy with it.**

 **117Jorn: Find out what happens after this loss next week, on STO.**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**


	19. Chapter 19

**Time/Date: circa 150,000 BCE**

 **Location: Delta Quadrant**

* * *

The dead were being counted, and while the Cylons and Iconian forces suffered, the Colonials took losses, and the _Saratoga_ had suffered more than a few hull breaches. 12 Vipers were damaged beyond repair, one of the Raptors was lost and 458 people had died, with thousands more wounded.

Admittedly, it could have been worse: the Tholians tipped the scales in their favor. But Larcei was still gone. And Jaden was blaming himself for it. And Takeshi and Luna had just shut down in their room. Though to be honest, the mood was felt across the entire ship: the little girl's loss hit everyone from the engineering staff, science teams, medics, MACO, and most especially the command staff.

Ron had buried himself in his work, her parents, as stated, were holed up in their room, Corpsa was on the holodeck (Jaden didn't think it was anything like the holotanks on UNSC ships, as he'd never used them and almost no one used the damn things) while Cassie joined her captain in micromanaging the entire fleet.

The engineering crew, though… they swarmed onto that Elachi ship. They thought they could do something. Sonja thought she could do anything. She claimed that Ron's Borg implants actually needed work, and she was the one that made him the juggernaut he was today. Jaden didn't care.

Noble, Eclipse, Echo team, all the UNSC personnel he left behind… all of them were dead. He was the UNSC grim reaper.

Like some monster, everything he touched and cared about died.

"Penny for your thoughts, Spartan?" Jaden glanced at the door, seeing a young woman wearing the NCO variant of the _Firestorm_ uniforms enter the lounge he decided to mope in.

Jaden sighed. "It- it's just…have you heard the tales of King Midas? The guy who could turn everything he touched into gold?" At a nod from the woman, he continued, "Well, it seems like I'm cursed in the other direction, where everything I touch dies. My first team, Echo, died leaving me the sole survivor. Then I entered Noble Team, and they died one by one. And now Larcei… the little girl who looked up to me as a brother, is…"

"We know. Commander Yamato and his wife are shocked. And then there's the Captain's reaction. He just… making him mad was a mistake. The Yamatos get mopey and quiet when they get hit with something like this. Pinkerton? He gets proactive, more lethal. Besides, she might be alive."

"What makes you say that, uh…sorry, what was your name again?"

"Satsuki Kiryuin, chief petty officer, 2nd Class. I think I was one of the people chasing you when you first came on board the _Firestorm_."

"Oh, uh… sorry about that," he said. "Anyway, why do you think she might be alive?"

"Because that was an Iconian gateway." At Jaden's confused look, she sighed. "I forgot; not from our universe. T'ket's people created those devices to cross from one room to another on another planet. The Science Council has a theory that they could cross into alternate universes." Dryly, she added, "Clearly, they can, since the bitch was here. That's why Commander Henderson is on board that Elachi ship: to find out which universe she was sent to. With any luck, we can modify the wormhole drive to send us there so we can pick her up, spend a week or two there and leave soon after."

Jaden nodded. "I see…" he said. "That, um, that makes sense. But…do they normally do the swirling suction vortex that one did?"

"THAT was caused by some idiot putting a bullet into the power distribution net; overloaded the damn thing. It happens when someone decides to screw with the settings."

"…That sounds really stupid."

"So does creating a gravity well using the main deflector dish, but it can be done." She got up, brushing her hair behind her ears. "I have to go; my sister's waiting for me on Deck 8, and this is one of the few times we have the same time off."

"Alright," Jaden said. "It…it was nice to meet you, Petty Officer Kiryuin. And thanks for the talk."

"My pleasure, Lieutenant." The woman walked out of the room, and Jaden got up, himself. If she was alive, he wasn't going to sit around and do nothing.

Spartans don't sit around doing nothing.

* * *

"Matt, hand me that microcaliper: I think I've almost gotten this console back online."

"Almost?"

"Well, it's either going to explode or it's going to turn on."

Matt nodded, before passing Sonja the requested tool.

He'd been helping the most on getting this Gateway going again, so they could find Larcei.

At least Takeshi and Luna were doing a little better… or at least, they had started coping the way they knew best, meaning that there was the chance that when they found Larcei again, she'd have a little brother or sister on the way.

Honestly, it was a wonder that it hadn't happened yet.

And knowing the captain, he'd walk in on them by accident.

Sonja adjusted the control crystal, and the console lit up like a christmas tree. She let out a whoop of joy. "IT LIVES!"

Matt facepalmed as Sonja pulled a Dr. Frankenstein and proceeded to cackle like a madwoman. "Ok, Commander, you've had your fun."

"No, I haven't. But you have a point; we have work to do. Get that interface working; I want to see the coordinates for the universe this thing was last set to. Then you and I have a week of modifications to make to the wormhole drive. The boss is not going to be happy."

Matt snorted. "The boss isn't really happy unless he's killing something."

"Oh, he can be happy at other times. But do you want to be the one to tell him that his niece has to wait another week before we can rescue her?"

Matt paled.

Takeshi and Luna would be displeased. Ron…

"You tell him."

"Fuck that, I ain't tellin' him! You will!"

"You're the chief engineer! He won't bite your head off!"

"And I'm giving you an order!"

Matt sighed. "Yes, ma'am…" he muttered.

 _Why do I always get the shit jobs?_ He wondered.

* * *

Admiral Adama did not want to know what Riza Pinkerton was doing on board his ship. He had only met the younger Pinkerton sibling once, and she didn't even speak during the attack briefing. But as she was in the modified starboard flight pod, which was fit with an atmospheric containment field, dancing around with what looked like a scythe, he decided to stay away from her.

"Is there something I can do for you, Admiral?"

Though he clearly didn't have a choice. "I didn't see you sign in with the LSO."

"I beamed over. Galactica's flight pods are the largest empty space in the fleet for me to practice using my scythe."

Adama didn't ask why she had one. He instead had something else on his mind. "Then why are you here?"

"I needed a place to vent where I couldn't accidentally hurt someone," she said.

"With that thing, I would think it's simple."

"The blade is monomolecular. It will cut through anything unshielded. And as the usual M-blade practice room is filled with refugees, I picked my second best choice."

Adama was horrified by the weapon in Riza's hands. It could hack through the hull if she wasn't careful. "Why the flight pod, then?" he asked worriedly. "Why not someplace with a bit less chance of punching a hole into vacuum?"

"You clearly worry too much, sir." The younger Pinkerton began twirling the scythe in her hands, the blade coming close to the deck plating, but never touching. The top of the staff hit the deck, and the young woman began doing acrobatic flips and spins with the bladed weapon in hand.

It was a dance of sorts. A lethal one. He pictured the pod full of Centurions, being hacked to pieces by that weapon, falling to pieces.

She finally came to a stop on the rear end of the pod, just on top of the Colonial seal. "My brother is an immovable object. If you push him, you will get nowhere and die for your troubles. I am the unstoppable force. If the enemy is in my way, they'll suffer for it."

"I...well, I think I'm already afraid of your crew, Ms Pinkerton."

"As long as you don't get on our bad side, you shouldn't have to be, Admiral."

With that, Riza returned to her scythe katas, and Adama left the pod. His allies were strange, their enemies stranger.

But that strangeness made them stronger for it, he supposed.

* * *

 **USS _Ra Cailum_ \- XO's Quarters**

* * *

Takeshi and Luna lay in the bed together, recovering from one of their more recent 'sessions', though the sheets were currently pulled over them in a moderate attempt to preserve modesty if someone were to walk in.

"I… I still can't really believe it," Takeshi whispered. "I mean, I know there's a chance Larcei's still alive, but… even just the thought of her being gone is…"

"Hey, hey. We'll get her back. Even if someone gets in the way, we'll get her back. She's got the angriest family in Starfleet looking for her. If we can't get to her, Ron will. You know what my brother's like. He'll throw the damn rulebook out the window if it means he gets to save his family." Oh, Takeshi didn't NEED any reminders. When B'vat threatened Riza, it took five minutes for the Klingon to die.

NO ONE threatens a Pinkerton's family, even if they aren't blood. Fuck with one, you fuck with all.

"Yeah… I know," he said. "And I know we'll get her back, too." He sighed. "It's just still hard to believe she's gone in the first place, you know?"

"I know. She was safe on Earth. Why the FUCK didn't we listen to him the first time?! He knew that bringing Larcei along was a bad idea, but instead, we let her come along just because she guilt tripped him. We should've left her with Aunt Ayame."

"Even my sister Ryoko would have been a better choice - and she's babysat Larcei before," Takeshi remarked. He then sighed. "Still, you're right, we'll find her again."

Luna kissed her husband. "Come on. Let's get dressed before that idiot brother of mine walks in."

Takeshi nodded. "Yeah, we probably should." He paused for a bit. "By the way…"

"Yes?" Luna asked.

"Maybe we should have Rutia check you out every so often," Takeshi remarked. "I mean, I'm kinda surprised we haven't given Larcei a younger brother or sister yet… and I can't deny that part of me would like to have another kid…"

"Well, with the injections Ron made mandatory for you, that's not really surprising." Takeshi paused and tripped as he got out of the bed. He'd been taking contraceptives since he became Ron's XO. 'if you're having a kid, it ain't on my ship!' was his line.

And with all the chaos, he didn't remember if he took his last shot.

He knew Ron might kick his butt if he knocked Luna up again, but with the current situation, he found that he didn't care.

* * *

 **Battlestar Galactica - Pilot's rec room**

* * *

Starbuck drank her shot of newly replicated booze with her new trainees.

Katraine thought she could take the top gun place from her, and Costanza didn't take it seriously. They lost 12 pilots. They weren't getting any replacements; this was it. No fleet academy, limited resources. If they fraked it up, they were dead.

"You think this is a frakking game, nuggets?"

"Come on, Lieutenant, with those new shields and weapons? It's a frakking joke."

"It's never a frakking joke, Hot Dog; those Mobius pilots were bobbing and weaving like we would against Raiders against those Iconian fighters. You still need to know how to frakking fly and fight."

Hot Dog was about to protest, before another presence made itself known "She's right," The nuggets all turned as the Spartan walked into the rec room. "Technology can break down, and Cylons are the _least_ of our worries now. Iconian and Elachi ships make Raiders look like chew toys from what I've seen."

"Lieutenant Jaden," Starbuck nodded, "Surprised you're here."

Jaden shrugged, pulling up a seat "Was curious about you Viper pilots," He said, "Wanted to see how similar you are to UNSC pilots like me."

This caused Starbuck - and several other nuggets - to look at him in surprise "You're a pilot?" She asked, surprised.

"One of the best Spartan pilots in the UNSCDF." He admitted, "Whenever I wasn't running the black ops for naval intelligence, they had me as a test pilot for experimentals like the YSS-1000 Saber Fighters, and flew a good number of combat missions."

He remembered his last. Jorge died during that mission. The first of Noble to die.

"Well, you're welcome in this room, pilot." Hot Dog blinked in confusion before he realized something. "What, no last name?"

"I was a war orphan when I was recruited into the Spartan program." Jaden shrugged "I lost my last name the day I joined."

"Well, frak, you need a new surname." Starbuck said, "Can't run around without one."

"The closest thing to a surname I've got is my SPARTAN tag." He said, pointing to his uniform. "All my files put me a Jaden-B312."

Starbuck smirked. Jaden would learn that this was a bad sign. "Listen up, pilots! Spartan Jaden here needs a new surname! And he ain't leaving this room until he does!"

Jaden groaned. "For fuck's sake, it's not that big a deal…" he muttered.

That didn't stop them. Names from Paine to godkiller rained down from the pilots' mouths. Although finally, one name came from Boomer that he liked: Takeo.

"Stop. STOP!" The pilots shut up at Jaden's yelling. "Alright, fine! Takeo! My last name's Takeo now! Happy?!"

"Better," Starbuck said, smirking "Though… now you need a middle name-"

"Darwin," Jaden said before she finished. "We're _not_ doing that again…"

"Spoilsport." Jaden threw his hands in the air before leaving. UNSC pilots were bad enough. The Starfleet people were like the rest of the _Ra Cailum's_ crew. But the Colonials were the WORST.

* * *

 **USS _Ra Cailum_**

* * *

The Senior Officers had assembled in the conference lounge with the Tholian Captain, as the Tholians were preparing to leave.

"Commander Akel, I extend the thanks of my entire crew. Without your help, we should have lost a lost of people."

"Your thanks are unnecessary. The Tholian Assembly did this because there is a debt we owe to you and your crew. A debt we fear we cannot repay, Pinkerton-Captain. We will give whatever assistance you need, but know this: your journey is your own. We cannot help those beginning their own first steps into multiversal travel."

Ron was not amused. But he understood. "Your version of the Prime Directive. There are times I wish it didn't exist."

"And I guess that explains how advanced the Tholians are, if they have a PD equivalent for multiversal travel," Takeshi remarked.

"We could not have expanded without that capability, Commander," Akel replied. "It… is not something mentioned often to outsiders, but I feel it is something you can be trusted with. Our civilization developed in a realm… between universes. To allow room for population expansion, we had to learn how to cross the universal barrier before we could learn how to cross the stars."

"Like the Sphere builders."

Akel screeched in Tholian, which was only shrill to everyone else.

"Fucking CHRIST, Akel! Do you kiss your mother with that crystal?!"

Except for the living universal translator named Ronald Pinkerton.

"Do not compare us to them! We only colonize what you call Class-Y planets; they destroy galaxies to create comfortable living spaces!"

Takeshi nodded. "Makes sense," he said. "Definite difference there. Anyway, even if you can't help us directly, do you…do you think you could send a message back to Starfleet for us? Let them know we're all right, and maybe send them our telemetry so they can find a way to send us some support?"

"We will inform your United Federation of your status. But we cannot inform them of your location. You must make your way back to your universe on your own. We faced this test. So must you."

"Remind me to find the idiot responsible for General Order One. That way I can SHOOT HIM. Repeatedly. With that positron cannon you want to build into my deflector dish."

"I wasn't thinking of sending them our location," Takeshi replied, even as he nodded to Ron's suggestion/request. "More like our sensor data - help them learn what we did and **_how_** we did it, so they can refine it and do it better, with more control."

"You did not create this on purpose?"

"Oh, we did. We thought it would be a better FTL drive. Instead, we've been jumping universes for almost two months. So if you could kindly do so, please send them the data. Just ours. And don't be condescending about it; even YOU had to stumble when it came to warp drive and other technologies."

"That… is true," Akel said after a moment. "Some of our first forays into transuniversal travel did not go quite as planned, and it took us several tries before we managed to achieve proper warp travel." There was a pause. "If anything, some of my kind are actually envious of you, for how your Zephram Cochrane managed to achieve Warp Travel on his first try with no assistance from outside sources."

The humans of the group (which was most of the senior staff) began chuckling. There was a reason, even if other races did it first, that Zephram Cochrane was called the inventor of warp drive. He didn't run fifty different test flights with every system separately; he put it all on the line with that ONE flight, with first contact being a goddamn fluke. Even the Vulcans took five centuries to get it done right.

"There's a phrase the Iconians are no doubt thinking of. 'Don't fuck with humanity'. We adapt quickly, rebuild quickly and we just refuse to DIE."

"Very true," Akel replied. "And you are very good at turning the tables on those trying to kill you, killing **_them_** instead." It looked at Ron. "You especially, Pinkerton… though there is another version of you out there who is even better at it."

"I doubt that."

"You should not. We will attempt to keep contact with your… fleet. Your Starfleet Command will require status reports and such. Our ambassadors will send them, as a gesture of goodwill. You have taken the first steps. Continue to take the path, and you will be considered equal to the assembly."

"We'll certainly do our best," Takeshi remarked. "Though if we keep picking up refugees and recruits at every stop, we're going to need even more ships, eventually."

"And ships with warp drive. Eventually, we're not going to be able to make the wormhole; we're slowing down. We'll barely be able to make Warp 1.4 with the Colonials, and none of their ships have the shape for a stable warp bubble to form, even if they had warp nacelles. The Sabers won't make up for it; we're moving a trillion tons of metal. We need ships that have bigger reactors and nacelles as powerful as a Galaxy's."

"We shall let your Starfleet Command know this," Akel replied. "For now, though, it is time for us to depart. Farewell, Pinkerton."

The Tholian beamed out, before Cassie looked at her captain. "They left one of their fighters behind in our main shuttlebay."

"It's a gift; their way of saying 'we're with you'. If you excuse me, I need to look over my new plane."

* * *

Jaden was impressed. The Widow the Tholians left behind was as heavily shielded as a _Peregrine_ , and as agile as most fighters in the UNSC inventory, according to records. Ron had asked him to help him look it over, as, alien or not, a plane was a plane.

"Very nice craft, though the looks are a bit odd," Jaden remarked. "Then again, it was probably built to Tholian design aesthetics, and meant as primarily a space fighter without much atmospheric abilities."

"That's what the secondary shields are for. Useless for defensive, but perfect for shaping the air around the craft."

"The hell did you do to get those walking crystals to like you?"

"Saved two of their colonies form the Borg, and during the Iconian War, I stopped T'ket from glassing the surface of Akati Minor, one of their major colonies, and Tholia, their homeworld. Tends to earn favors; I saved their civilization."

"Huh," Jaden replied. "Yeah, I guess that would earn favors. Too bad we didn't have anything like that happen in our war with the Covenant."

"Sucks to be you." The doors to the shuttlebay opened, and in came Sonja, Matt, and Mitod. "Ladies. Matt. Something I can do for you?"

"Well, Boss, we have good news and bad news," Matt said. "Good news is we should be able to track where that gate sent Larcei."

"And the bad news?"

Matt winced. "…It'll take us about a week to make the necessary modifications."

"…A week. A week of my niece, being in unknown territory, cold, starving, and quite possibly dead. WHY THE HELL AREN'T YOU IDIOTS IN ENGINEERING, MAKING THOSE MODIFICATIONS?!"

Matt had paled as Ron had begun building for the screaming, and actually flinched as it started. This was worse than normal.

Though that was to be expected, given the situation.

"Y-yessir! I'll get to it right away!" Without any further ado, and with no illusions of propriety, Matt _vanished_ , a small cloud of smoke where he had been as he ran to Engineering as fast as he could.

"And why the hell aren't you two following him?!"

Both seemed to vanish, without the smoke. Jaden thought he heard something as they did.

"You _are_ mad."

"You've known Larcei for less than two months. I've known her since I was freed from the collective. That being two years ago! She is my blood. I want her found and securely put back in her quarters. Taking her with us was a mistake."

Jaden nodded. He'd heard that Larcei normally didn't stay on the ship, but had gotten permission to come aboard and be with her parents for a bit - and now she was gone.

He could understand Ron's feelings on the situation. And why he thought it was a mistake. "I've known UNSC engineers. Dr Halsey made the original MJOLNIR suit. Your people are better. If anyone can find her, they can. But… how?"

"I'll leave that to them to explain. Come on, let's finish checking over this thing."

"Right," Jaden replied, as they got back to work checking over the fighter.

* * *

"As some of you know, every universe has its' own quantum resonance signature. That way, it can be identified as something native or foreign." Sonja pressed a button on the monitor, continuing the presentation for the Colonial/UNSC/XCOM personnel, as well as the command staff.

"Yeah, they taught us that at the Academy," Takeshi replied. "I assume this ties in with how we'll be looking for Larcei?"

"In spite of Commander Yamato's ease of confusion towards the terms dimension and universe…" Everyone took a brief laugh at Takeshi's expense, including his wife and Ron. "Yes. We recovered the last set of coordinates from the gateway control unit, and we've begun modifying the wormhole drive to take us there. Fair warning, once we do this, we can't easily head back to our universe."

"I refuse to leave my niece behind, Commander. Get on with it."

"And I'm definitely not leaving my daughter behind," Takeshi added vehemently, with Luna nodding.

"Yeh, figured. Point is, once we get there, we're going to stress the engines to their limits. We're not going home for a while after that."

Takeshi nodded. "One way trip, basically," he said. "Fine by me."

"We've got the tools to rebuild the nacelles in the field. We just need the materials. Admiral, we're going to need those mining ships in the field, round the clock. Strip those rocks to nothing, bring the materials back here."

"Done."

"Takeshi, you're on the ground once we find her, if she's on a planet. How close will this get us?"

"It'll take us to a 'nexus point'. Like if it took us home, it'd be Earth orbit."

"If she's on a planet, I'll find her," Takeshi replied.

"If there's no other business—"

"Let's get Larcei back," Jaden nodded, before turning around to get his MJOLNIR ready.

"Actually, Captain, there is one final piece of business." Ron looked to Adama and Roslin, who seemed rather… close. Perhaps fear of Ron's reaction helped overcome Adama's distrust of the newly-sworn in president.

On the other hand, she was a redhead, and EVERYONE loves the redheads, even if she was of the older variety.

"Yes?"

"During our sweep of one of the baseship wrecks, we found bodies."

"Oh, fuckery."

"They're all Cylons, Captain."

Takeshi blinked. "So, what, did they make humanlike versions of themselves or something?" he asked.

"At least seven models. We captured one of them at Ragnar Anchorage."

"Didn't your report say you bashed his brains in with a flashlight?" Ron smiled before looking at Luna before yelling something at the top of his lungs. "THERE! ARE! FOUR! LIGHTS!"

The Colonials and UNSC personnel just stared at the insane captain. "What the hell was that about?"

Luna groaned. "A bit of Cardassian Torture 'humor'," she said.

Ron shrugged. "Captain Picard suffered a bit of it and came through without caving. I'm just having fun at Gul Madred's expense."

"Captain, we can identify at least five other people in the fleet who look like this. One of my Raptor pilots is a frakking Cylon."

"Sounds like they were employing the idea of sleeper agents," Takeshi remarked. "Insert someone to pose as one of your enemy, only to turn at the most opportune moment. Only, since the Cylons are essentially sentient computers, they might have taken it a step further and actually implanted false personalities. She might not even **_know_** she's a Cylon."

"My XO is tempted to space her."

"No. Keep it a secret from her. I've got the psychologist from hell on board, and I'm going to milk her for all she's worth. We'll deprogram the little lady. If push comes to shove, I'll deal with her. A little machine-on-machine combat wouldn't hurt."

Roslin blinked. "Wait, what?"

Takeshi facepalmed. "Right, has anyone told you about the Borg yet?"

"No."

"Cybernetic zombies with a hive mind that add people to their collective, unwillingly. My brother here was one of them."

The Colonials stared at Ron before he shrugged. "Meh. I got better."

"That's not reassuring, Commander."

"We've figured out techniques to rescue and separate people from the hive mind, Madam President," Rutia told her. "Unfortunately, in recent years they've made the cybernetic implants harder to remove - or rather, they replace more of the victim with cybernetics, to the point where removing the cybernetics could kill the victim."

"He's 70% machine; even half his brain's gone." She leaned in and whispered into her ear. "Personally, I think he's more sane than he was before he got assimilated."

"Hey!"

Almost everyone around the room laughed. "Anyway, this makes Ron nearly indestructible, in that he has standard personal shields plus Borg shields," Takeshi explained. "His body itself is more durable, too."

Adama looked at Ron. He had the Admiral's figure, only slightly stockier with the hint of a gut. "Don't be fooled; he can lift a runabout with his bare hands and his bones are tougher than Jaden's. He can even survive a photon torpedo exploding in his face." Sonja started whistling. Luna deadpanned, "It actually happened."

Another round of laughs came from the Starfleet personnel, while everyone else was slightly confused and/or nonplussed.

"Well, send them to the _Ra Cailum_. We'll deal with them. Without shooting them. Hopefully."

* * *

"I don't understand, sir, why am I being transferred to the _Ra Cailum_? You need all the pilots you can get."

"Yes, but so do they." Adama informed, looking at the confused Starbuck "Considering we'll be working together now, we're going to have a few pilot exchange programs, share experience, tactics, all that."

"Who else?"

"Boomer, some of your new pilots," he informed. "Maybe she'll stop crashing into the deck without the Chief watching." Boomer and Tyrol had been sleeping together for months; they'd ignored it for one simple reason: _Galactica_ was being decommissioned, and they were pulling out of the service.

Now, he wasn't tolerating it. As soon as Boomer left the ship, he was putting a stop to their relationship.

He wasn't dealing with any further drama. "At least you'll be training in using the new Mk VIIIs. We'll phase out the VIIs as they come off the line."

Starbuck sighed, but nodded. "Understood," she said, smirking slightly. "Guess I get to be first in line to try 'em out."

"We've got a week, Lieutenant. You'll have your flight time. Dismissed." Starbuck saluted before looking at the list.

Boomer, Crashdown, all of her nuggets, a few of the knuckledraggers, half of Galactica's Marines… In exchange, they got a few UNSC pilots and a squad of MACOs, plus a few mechanics from the Ra Cailum's engineering team.

Her eyes narrowed at the sighting of Gaius Baltar's name. They wanted him for 'his scientific expertise'. In reality, Captain Pinkerton wanted to keep an eye on him; he knew that the CNP was reprogrammed by a Cylon, and had informed the military personnel. Ron thought that Gaius was tricked; after all, no one knew the Cylons were human until now.

Starbuck would know: she was the first one to see a copy of Boomer in the debris. She was probably being transferred for 'deprogramming'; there was another Cylon on Pegasus, too. The SF Marines had to stun her to bring her in.

She wasn't looking forward to this.

* * *

Takeshi sighed as the Raptors and Vipers came in. Ron wanted him busy, so he put the man in charge of greeting the new arrivals before he was sent out on a 'last run' through the colonies with the only empty ships in the fleet. In short: they were taking everything not bolted down and bringing it with them.

"Well, I can understand the reasoning behind the new pilots coming in," Takeshi remarked. "Wish I didn't have to greet them personally, what with the last run into the colonies coming up."

"What he wants is our minds off Larcei. He thinks keeping us buried in our work will distract us until the jump. He's wrong, but his heart's in the right place." As usual, his wife was right. An asshole to his enemies while he treats his allies like anyone else would treat family.

"Besides, we're going to be working with them for a while; why not meet some new faces?" The alarms went off, signalling the opening of the bay doors.

"Point taken," Takeshi remarked, as the craft came in. "Well, let's meet the newbies."

"Bets on how long until they're like the rest of us?"

"Not taking that action, Luna."

The gunships, Raptors, they were called, landed first, their side hatches allowing the new people to leave before the Vipers were tractored in, put down on their landing skids. He recognized the Cylon: a Sharon Valerii, callsign 'Boomer'. "Commander Yamato? I'm Lieutenant Valerii, but you can just call me Boomer."

Takeshi imagined there was a story behind that name, but he didn't think they had enough time to ask. "Right. I'm Commander Takeshi Yamato, this is my wife Lunamaria. Depending on the situation, you can refer to me and my wife by our first names. Just don't try to shorten them; I have enough problems with my brother-in-law constantly doing it."

"Wait, your brother in law?" Luna nodded. "Yes Specialist… Socionius, yes?" The young deckhand nodded. "The captain is my stepbrother, but we might as well be blood. No, we didn't get our posts through nepotism; at first, Ron beat the crap out of Takeshi once he found out we were dating."

"Umm, Okay." Boomer nodded. "A-Anyways, looking forward to working with the _Ra Cailum_ , sir… where do we set up?"

Takeshi gestured towards the doors leading into the ship, where NCOs were waiting. "The crewmen there will escort you to quarters, so you can get your personal belongings squared away."

The Colonials got moving, and the married couple left the bay. "This is not going to end well."

"Dearest husband, this is the _Ra Cailum_. Since when does anything end well?"

Takeshi groaned. "You're right."

* * *

The _Firestorm_ launched from the _Ra Cailum_ , refit with a new FTL drive. The _Defender_ -class refugee ships _Recovery_ and _Terra Nova_ joined them, as well as the _Loki_ -class _Gremlin_. "We're not expecting many survivors, are we?"

"Not really," Takeshi replied. "Though the main goal here isn't survivors. If we find any, that's a bonus, but this is primarily a salvage run. Everyone remember that!"

" _This is engineering: FTL drive spun up. This is our first time using the damn thing, so I'd like not to explode while doing it._ "

"Understood," Takeshi replied. "Take it nice and easy, here." He reached for the newly added jump controls.

"Takeshi, just push the damn button."

"I don't want to blow up the ship, Luna." His wife pointedly walked over to the console and pushed the button on the new station.

After a few seconds, the ship Jumped, heading back into the Cyrannus System.

"There. Was that so hard?"

"You're getting testy, aren't you, wifey?"

"Our daughter is missing; WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK?!" Clearly, Ron's mother had more influence on Luna than Takeshi originally thought.

Ayame acted the same way when Ron went missing on Nopada. The Tal Shiar were nearly culled to extinction that week.

"Alright, then, let's just get this over with," Takeshi remarked, not wanting to get on Luna's bad side when she was like this.

He was scared of Ayame Virgillia Pinkerton at the best of times. For his wife to be emulating her to this degree…

It was… horrifying. 'Note to self: stay away from Ron's mother.' The _Firestorm_ and her escorts set course for Virgon, which was one of the outer planets in orbit of Helios Gamma. There were plenty of wrecks, including a pair of almost intact _Mercury_ -Class battlestars, one of which was the _Atlantia_. Their job was to repair the ships that could be repaired, fill them to the brim with salvage, and return to the fleet to offload and start all over again.

Sure, it was a little like grave robbing, but the Colonials had given their permission to repair and salvage the wreckage, and Ron had ordered them to do it.

"Alright, get the salvage teams in motion," Takeshi ordered. "Brok'tan, you have the bridge. Luna, with me."

Luna begrudgingly took a phaser rifle out of a weapons locker. Again, the 'projectile weapons and starships' law remained in effect, so no modified SRS-99C.

Besides, fucking thing was a gauss cannon: even with that thing's armor plating, she would punch through the hull like a finger through water.

Didn't mean she was happy about it. "I know it makes sense, but there's something about firing a gun that a phaser rifle just doesn't have."

Takeshi chuckled. "Yeah," he replied, "just like how I feel that ranged combat doesn't have the exact same thrill as getting up close, and yet Ron always insists that I carry **_something_** other than my katana."

They left the bridge, heading for the transporter room.

* * *

 **Battlestar _Toltec_**

* * *

Takeshi, Luna, and the engineering crew beamed into the ship, wearing EV suits as the atmosphere was vented. "Alright, people. Three teams, two security personnel each. No one wanders off alone. Clear?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Then get moving. I want this ship flying under its' own power in three hours. Try to make it less."

The teams scattered, heading to different portions of the ship to get it running again.

"Gravity's offline; that's going to be a little inconvenient."

Luna agreed. "At least we've got magnetic boots. Otherwise, we'd be floating in the black."

Takeshi stopped for a second. "Luna, do you feel that?"

Luna paused, and nodded. "Yeah," she said. "We're not alone here." She then took a quick glance at Takeshi. "By the way, your eyes are glowing again."

"Dammit…" Takeshi muttered. "It used to be they'd glow only when I was using my psionics, but lately they've just started glowing full time, and I've had to focus on keeping the glow **_off_**. It's been getting harder, recently - I might need reflective sunglasses if we ever need to go undercover someplace."

"I noticed you've been using hair dye, too," Luna remarked. "Something else related to your Psionics?"

"Yeah," Takeshi admitted with a sigh. "Ever since I gained them, my hair's started turning white - not old-person gray, but straight-up pure white. Didn't want to have people raise questions, so I got hair dye from Rutia."

"Maybe the mad geniuses will come up with—" A hatch exploded outwards, and they were met with the roving red eye and shiny chrome plating of a Cylon Centurion. It had taken some hits, but otherwise was ready for combat.

"Great, a walking, talking toaster." Takeshi drew his sword, but the Centurion deployed its 6mm machine guns, firing at the pair. Luna took a potshot at the robot, hitting the right shoulder, but only doing cosmetic damage. The Centurion focused on Takeshi, who attempted to cut the robot in half, only for it to catch his arm and extend its' own talons before swiping, hacking through the EVA suit and venting Takeshi's air into space.

Takeshi fell back to patch his suit, even as Luna fired a higher-setting blast, hitting the Centurion in the torso and melting a hole clean through it.

Luna looked at her husband's suit, wincing at the damage. Takeshi's air supply was down to three minutes, so he was going to have to go back to the ship. "It appears my brother has a point about melee being a last resort."

"Don't you get started on that, too."

"Takeshi, WHICH of us nearly suffocated here?"

Takeshi sighed. "Alright, fine, so it isn't the best of options in vacuum like this," he said. "Anyway, I'll beam back to the ship, get a fresh suit with a fresh air supply, and then come back here."

"Be prepared for your ass to be torn a new hole when Ron hears about this!"

Takeshi groaned as he activated his emergency transponder and beamed back to the _Firestorm_.

Because he was NOT looking forward to Ron's gloating.

* * *

Matt was impressed. The Colonials had merged high and low-tech into a warship that, if it had shields and particle weapons, would impress even the Klingons. In fact, the _Mercury_ had a passing resemblance to the _Vo'quv_ -class dreadnought carrier in configuration.

No wonder the boss wanted these things recovered: they could kick anyone in the teeth when these things were refit with Starfleet-grade weapons.

Still, they'd all encountered Cylons aboard at some point, so all teams were still on alert, even as Matt worked on getting the systems back up.

" _Lunamaria to all teams: my husband's suit was torn open._ "

"Captain Pinkerton's going to have FUN with that. What happened?"

" _A Centurion cut open the suit._ "

Matt winced. Ron had been trying to convince Takeshi to carry a phaser with him at all times, instead of convincing him once in awhile. Now the poor bastard had no choice once the man was through with him.

" _I've gotten a new suit from Engineering, so I'm good to go for now,_ " Takeshi himself said. " _Let's just get this done._ "

"I've gotten the sublights back online: FTLs will take a while longer. I'm more worried about the hull. I'm going to need more reinforcing materials to make sure this thing can survive a jump. Think you can make a run back to the _Ra Cailum_ , sir?"

" _I should be able to,_ " Takeshi replied. " _Everyone be careful, though - Luna and I will be back ASAP._ "

"Not looking forward to his return."

* * *

 **USS _Firestorm_**

* * *

Takeshi wasn't looking forward to this. Once he made his report, the Pinkerton siblings were going to ruin his day. While they carried bladed weapons on them, neither used them as their first resort. If anything, they were usually the last thing they pulled out, unless Riza was in the mood to be an acrobat or Ron was mad enough not to care.

" _Ra Cailum_ is hailing us, Commander."

"Put them through, Rina," Takeshi replied, not looking forward to it, but wanting to get it over with.

Ron's face appeared on the screen. " _Take, what's up?_ "

"We need some duranium plating; we've found a couple of salvageable ships, we just need to repair them for their return jumps."

" _And you look like your day's been ruined. The fuck happened?_ "

Takeshi sighed. "Ran into a Cylon on one of the ships," Takeshi informed. "It… kinda trashed my EVA suit."

" _Perhaps NOW you get the point? Melee is a LAST resort if you've got nowhere to run. Start carrying a phaser before I_ fuse one to your hand _. I'm not telling your sister that you died because you were too stupid and stubborn to adapt. Because I WILL be telling her that: 'your brother's dead because he was too dumb to PICK UP A FUCKING PHASER AND USE IT!'_ "

"Alright, alright," Takeshi sighed. "I'll start taking a phaser along as standard issue." Under his breath, he muttered, "Though whether I'll default to using it first in non-EVA scenarios is another story entirely…"

" _Try outside close-quarters period. If they're at range, you shoot them. If they're not within 4 meters, use a ranged weapon. We'll beam over the supplies. And when we find Larcei… I will tell her about this. Ra Cailum Actual out._ "

The call ended, and Takeshi put his head in his hands.

"Don't feel bad. If anything, it's his way of trying to make sure Larcei has a father that her great-grandchildren can meet. He's just defaulting to the asshole-way of expressing it."

Takeshi sighed. "He's never had a non-asshole way of expressing things, Luna," he replied. "Probably why the only girl with an interest in him is his ship's AI… which is rather odd when you think about it that way."

"Matters are made worse when he's clueless."

"Heh," Takeshi replied. "I look forward to never letting him hear the end of it once she finally gets a body of her own and he finally understands the joys of sex, courtesy of her jumping him."

"I'm not. Have you heard him scream?"

"…good point…"

* * *

 **Tauron orbit**

* * *

Dozens of damaged military and civilian ships orbited the planet, one of which was a larger version of the agro ships in the fleet at Prolmar. Takeshi was not looking forward to this one.

After all, it was big enough to hold livestock.

"That thing's three times the size of an _Oddy_ and four times the mass. An almost literal Noah's ark."

"Getting it working is going to be a pain, though we could probably use the space it'd provide."

"Still picking up lifesigns, too," Kim remarked. "Non-human; the animals survived. Oh, won't that be fun."

A flash caught Takeshi's eye as a baseship jumped into orbit. It appeared that the Cylons were more than a little mad with them after T'ket got screwed over.

"Might as well drive that baseship off, first," Takeshi remarked. "They're more an annoyance in space than anything else, but if we leave them be, they'll do just that, annoy us."

"Baseship is launching raiders," Kim informed. "Radiological readings indicate that all of them are carrying nukes."

While nukes were little more than bad bug bites to the Starfleet ship, the Colonials' ships, not so much. "Set cannons to scatter fire; I'll drain the power cells dry if I have to, but we're not getting any more nuclear explosions this week if I can say anything about it."

The _Firestorm_ flew at the Baseship, its cannons spitting fire out at the enemy raiders, turning a majority of them into fireballs, before firing a volley of photon torpedoes.

One Raider jumped away, but the jump drive failed, and the raider slammed into the hull after reappearing just after the baseship was hit by the torpedoes, exploding and destroying it. "Well, that was fun."

"We're going to need to clean off that section of the hull, but other then that, no damage."

"Ok, let's get moving; the Cylons are going to keep this up until either we're all dead or they are."

* * *

 **Caprica**

* * *

"You'd think there would be more…"

Samuel T. Anders had to agree with his fellow survivor's assessment, as the latter used a PSG1 Sniper to scout out the military base ahead. They saw a few humans around (humanoid Cylons no doubt) plus a handful of Centurions… but that was about it. For being a military base, they expected more resistance than this. At first they thought there would be more inside, but… barely anyone comes in or out, and there isn't too much movement inside.

It felt so easy, it might as well be a trap. But they need the supplies.

"What do we do?" The Sniper asked.

"We hit 'em hard and fast," Samuel said. "Take out the toasters first, we'll spit the others into two teams and strike the gates, take out the rest of them."

"You got it, Anders." The resistance was hitting the toasters hard and fast, whenever they could. Although the when was getting more and more rare; they seemed to be pulling out, leaving behind a skeleton force. Hell, the last two raids had zero chrome presence and no skinjobs. Either the Cylons were going for psychological warfare, lulling them into a false sense of security, or they just didn't care about the humans that didn't get killed.

A hum was heard in the air. "The frak is that?"

The remaining Bucs looked up, finding a new craft in the air. It was more human-looking, but not Colonial: didn't even look like a Raptor, more like a civilian shuttle.

And it was firing **_frakking energy beams_** at the toasters.

"Ok, what in Hades is that thing?"

"The frakking cavalry! Move in!"

* * *

Takeshi had left the _Firestorm_ in Brok'tan's hands so he could go down and kill the Cylons himself. While he wasn't Ron, he DID enjoy watching idiots be turned into burned corpses.

As such, he decided to go down in the _Cyclone_ and get some payback for Larcei.

And he was finding it rather cathartic, to be honest, as he melted Cylon after Cylon into slag.

Gunfire from the treeline signalled the arrival of the local resistance, using military surplus to fight the Centurions and organic models, which Tigh had coined 'skinjobs'. He was reminded of that movie Ron made him watch during their trip to the 21st Century: Blade Runner.

It was fitting, in a way.

He left the perimeter Cylons to the locals, as he moved deeper into the base to continue melting Cylons into slag.

He could have stayed near them to provide RFCAS, but in this instance, he thought it'd be better to let the resistance have their kills while he had his own kills.

"Ra Cailum _to Yamato: are you having fun, Take?_ "

"Not in the mood for jokes, Ron."

" _Oh, come on, indulge me here. You're flying around, blowing shit up while I have to deal with a fucking terrorist. Tempted to just punch a hole in the_ Astral Queen _and be done with it: Tom Zarek is not worth the trouble._ "

"I'm surprised you haven't vented the guy out the nearest airlock or beamed him into space yet. Anyway, for your information, melting Cylons is turning out to be less 'fun' and more… cathartic."

"Oh, it's bullshit. Captain Adama wants to talk, preaching about the right thing to do. The right thing to do is just kill the idiot and his lackies. Adama and Roslin agree. Anything else to report? Like Iconians?"

"No Iconians, but I have found a group of survivors - let them have a group of Cylons at the entrance to the base I'm at while I moved deeper in to avoid potential kill steals on either side," Takeshi informed. "And if I remember correctly, don't you practically **_thrive_** on just taking out the trash with no fuss, aside from when you make the brass pull their hair out at your methods?"

"Fuck yes. But I'm trying to be nice before I unleash my usual methods."

"You always try to be nice before you do it anyways."

"As with all things, it's the thought that counts. How's it going?"

"Salvage ops are going smoothly, and the chrome drones are turning into nice satisfying piles of slag," Takeshi remarked. "Want me to recover the detritus to either make coinage or feed into the replicators?"

" _Don't tempt me; I'm considering making_ Ra Cailum _-mint coinage_." Takeshi facepalmed. He couldn't tell if that was a joke or not. " _But sure, I'll send a few shuttles. Maybe I can use the wreck to make Centurions under my direct control, like the Sectopods. What is it the troops call them? Ronopods?_ "

Takeshi sighed, smiling. "Yes, Ron."

" _Then make sure a few of them are intact! Pinkerton out._ "

"Roger," Takeshi replied as the comm channel closed. Well, looks like he was going to have to land to recover some of the slag, and to take a few intact corpses back to the ship.

* * *

Anders watched the gunship (which it WAS) take down Cylons with freaking laser beams.

He had to admit, it was fun seeing the Cylons get their asses kicked.

"Woo!" One of the resistance members shouted out, pumping a fist into the air "Now _that_ is a fucking beautiful sight! How do ya like _that_ , ya frakking toasters!?"

Some shots turned from utter destructive to simply disabling, as centurions hit the ground, barely operating. Anders cocked his UMP45 to finish one before a beam hit the ground really close to his position. " _Sorry, but my captain wants those things intact. He's a bit of a… technovore, shall we say._ "

"Jeez!" Samuel shouted, jumping at how close the strike was - how accurate _were_ those guns of theirs? "Who the hell are you people?!"

" _United Federation of Planets, Starfleet,_ " came the reply from the shuttle. " _We...well, we've dropped in from a parallel universe. An FTL improvement experiment sent us realm-hopping. We've rescued quite a few refugees, and we're just doing a final salvage run before we make our next trip, bringing the refugees with us._ "

"You're just running?! You got the toasters on the run!"

" _We're just one ship. We can't fight off the whole Cylon army. Look, I'll make sure your people are evaced. You don't deserve to be left behind; the radiation will kill you if the Cylons don't. Don't be stupid._ "

The resistance member was about to protest, but Sam rose his hand. "He's right," he said. "We can't stay here. We need to think about the others." He looked back at the craft. "If you can get all of us out of here as soon as fracking possible, that'd be great!"

" _Guide me to your hideout and I'll get everyone out of here in seconds._ "

They doubted that.

They shouldn't've.

* * *

 **USS _Firestorm_**

* * *

In swirls of light, seven resistance members materialized on the transporter pad.

"Come on, move!" the Transporter Operator said. "Clear the pad! Need to make room for the next group!"

"What the f—"

"Don't ask; just go!"

They left as the transporter cycled again.

" _Bridge to transporter room: we're picking up an Elachi ship on sensors: Monbosh-Class. We need to pick up the last of those people and go; against one of those, we're screwed. You know that._ "

"Yeah, we know," the Operator replied. "Move it, people, make room!"

* * *

 **USS _Ra Cailum_ \- seven days later**

* * *

"Modifications to the wormhole drive are ready. Who's ready to leave?"

"Me."

"Me."

"ALLAH!"

Everyone stared at Ron, who had randomly screamed. "I'm trying to amuse you people. Get the fleet into formation."

Takeshi sat in the XO chair, watching as the other ships formed up. "We're coming for you, Larcei," Takeshi whispered. "Just stay safe until we can get there…"

Jaden stood on the bridge, his eyes set on the viewscreen as the various ships formed around them. ' _Not this time…_ ' he thought, his hands clenched. ' _I won't lose you too, Larcei…_ '

"Sonja, Riza. Punch it!"

"Extending warp field. Preparing to jump to warp speed. Hold onto your pants." The ship began to move forward, joined by the rest of the fleet. 'We're coming, Larcei. And there ain't going to be a fucking thing to stop us!' The fleet entered the wormhole as it formed, leaving the universe behind.

And entering a new frontier.

* * *

 **117Jorn: Keep your fingers crossed - we're going to find one lost little girl!**

 **Ron the True Fan: Time to cause a little well-intended mass murder! (Dr. Evil theme) …Of an unknown enemy…**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Yep - and we'll find Larcei, no matter wh… OK, who are you?**

 **?: Don't you recognize me? I'm hurt.**

 **117Jorn: Wait, you… Ah, shit…**

 **Ron the True Fan: Who the hell are you and why am I reminded of a DS9 episode? …Oh, FUCKERY.**

 **Ja Ne!**


	20. Chapter 20

**Time/Date: May 15th, 2035**

 **Location: Earth, Random Newscasts**

* * *

" _Excitement continues to build as city centers across the globe prepare for the 20th anniversary of Unification Day,_ " said a black-haired female newscaster on one channel.

On another channel, a blonde newscaster announced, " _Thousands line up at the site of the Great Accord, celebrating the formation of the ADVENT Coalition._ "

On yet another channel, a male newscaster said, " _In keeping with their promise to humanity, 12 new gene therapy clinics will be opening in select cities by the end of the new year._ "

" _Despite the attack by fringe elements,_ " yet another newscaster on yet another channel informed, " _operations at the new facility in Paris thankfully remain unaffected._ "

" _In response to the unprovoked intrusion on the eve of our most beloved celebration,_ " a male broadcaster with dark skin and gray hair informed, "the Speaker reaches out to us…"

A somewhat balding man in sunglasses with… strange spot-like markings on the side of his neck stepped up to a podium.

" _A small number of dissidents again repeat the mistakes of the old world,_ " the man said. " _Striking as we celebrate a benevolent savior who time and again offers only friendship and compassion. Yet these trivial actions could never break the bond between humanity and the Elders…_ "

" _Peacekeeping forces have already made several pre-emptive arrests of known collaborators,_ " the first newscaster said.

* * *

 **Earth, ADVENT City Center, City of New Berlin**

* * *

" _ADVENT again assures all citizens that today's celebrations will continue as planned,_ " the newscaster said on a public display screen, a large crowd gathered around.

One of the audience, a man with short, graying hair and a developing beard, turned away from the screen as he muttered, "Perfect…" before entering a line headed to a security checkpoint.

As the man made his way up to the checkpoint, a speaker system nearby intoned, " _The ADVENT Administration reminds you to report all suspicious activity to your nearest peace keeper. Remember, only together can we build a better tomorrow._ "

At the same time, a young woman with dark hair which ran out the back of her baseball cap in a ponytail approached the checkpoint from another direction. "Approaching position," she whispered into a headset. "You were right, they've definitely got their hands full today."

"Stay focused," the man replied, whispering into his own comm system. "Prep Gatecrasher, 60 seconds."

The man was then waved forward through a scanner assembly at the checkpoint. The scanner went off as he passed through it, and ADVENT Troopers pointed their weapons at the man as he raised his hands.

As the troopers gathered around the man, the woman watched, hiding behind a nearby barricade, before moving up to a nearby armored car.

"Mor Balaten," said an ADVENT Officer, its red and black armor differentiating it from the purely black-armored Troopers as it approached the man, who didn't respond, even as it slammed the butt of its rifle into his gut, sending him to his knees with a hiss of pain.

The woman took a small pentagonal object and attached it to the car. The device had a blinking red light and a series of buttons - she hit a special sequence of buttons, and the light turned green as she quickly stepped away from the car.

"Mor Balaten!" the ADVENT Officer repeated as the man stood.

He made no direct reply, just waiting a few seconds before he said, "Now."

The woman held up a remote and clicked the button. The pentagonal object revealed itself to be a powerful explosive when it detonated, destroying the car and sending ADVENT Troops flying.

* * *

As the crowd erupted into chaos, a young woman watching from some distance away on a monitor said, "Signal received. Loud and clear." Turning to another pair of monitors, she said, "OK, Gatecrasher, Buster, your turn."

On two small VTOL Transports flying towards the city, eight human soldiers prepared for battle, six on one transport and two on the other. The two by themselves readied assault rifles, while the team of six readied a variety of weapons: shotguns, pistols, SMGs, sniper rifles, machine cannons, grenade launchers, one team member even had a katana and a utility knife.

The one with the two melee weapons was a woman, around age 21, and as her transport veered off towards the large statue of an Elder in the middle of town, she thought about the path that had lead her to this point…

* * *

 _She had arrived on this world eighteen years earlier, a three-year-old girl spit out of a swirling hole in reality. A team of soldiers had found her, led by one she recognized as Central Officer Bradford from the XCOM Project. He hadn't recognized her, however, which told her this wasn't the Bradford she knew, and therefore it was a different world._

 _One where XCOM had lost to the Ethereals instead of overcoming them, and had gone underground as the Ethereals set up the ADVENT coalition._

 _She had asked to help, and in the absence of Commander Sheridan and with serious manpower shortages, Bradford had been forced to agree, as she was trained how to fight. She had taken the path of a Ranger, one who slipped through the shadows to bring the fight to the enemy at close range, and had become quite skilled, taking the callsign of 'Tempest'._

 _She still retained fond memories of the ones she left behind, though, as she waited for them to catch up…_

* * *

' _Tou-san… Kaa-san…_ ' Tempest thought. ' _I know I'll see you again… just please hurry… we'll need your help… along with Uncle Ron's… and Jaden-kun's…_ '

"We're over the drop zone!" the pilot of their Skyranger Transport announced. "Buster Team, Deploy!"

Tempest nodded, as the ramp on the back opened and the six soldiers slid down cables to the ground.

Time to show the world that XCOM wasn't out of the fight just yet.

* * *

 **USS _Ra Cailum_**

* * *

The ship was the first to exit the wormhole, followed by _Galactica_ , _Pegasus_ and the rest of the fleet.

And Ron was getting ready for war, putting on his full suit of MACO armor: he was going down there personally. "Report!"

Kim pressed keys to start the scanning process, and the computer processed the information and gave her the most important piece: the quantum signature. "Signature matches the one from the gateway; we're here, sir; location, Sol system!"

"Set a course for Earth! And run continuous scans of the system: I want nothing to go wrong! We find her, we get out. Scan the planet for the isolinear tag I implanted into her spine; we should be able to find her general location."

Luna and Takeshi looked at Ron in shock. "You put a tag into our little girl's SPINE?"

"Don't take it personally; I had it done to everyone on the ship in case something like this happened. Granted, I wasn't expecting it to be an alternate universe, but that should show you how much I DON'T like people going missing."

"I don't care as long as we find Larcei," Jaden said, still suited up in his armor. "Cassie, you have anything for us?"

"One moment," the A.I said. "Scanning comms and satellite fre-" she blinked, before letting out a groan. "Shit, Alpha's not gonna like this…"

"What is it?" Ron asked, as Cassie snapped her fingers and the front view screen displayed a video.

" _…in a shocking turn of events, a local Gene clinic was hit by terrorist forces,_ " a news reporter said. " _ADVENT reports, however, that the clinic should be back up and running within the week, for damage was not too severe. However in other news, during the attack on the clinic, another group of terrorists destroyed the Elder statue in New Berlin city square - a monument to the unity between the ADVENT coalition and the Ethereal people who helped unify our world…_ "

There was silence on the bridge. "Did she say… _Ethereal_?" Jaden asked. "As in… those fucks we fought with…"

"With XCOM? Yeah," Takeshi replied. "This must be a universe where XCOM lost or something." He frowned. "To think Larcei's down _there_."

"Hack into the planetary satellite network and search for the VHF and VLF freqs being transmitted by Larcei's implant."

Jaden looked at Ron with worry. "Did you put these implants in us?"

"No, just my crew. We haven't had the time to do it to anyone else. Larcei's was given to her just before we left."

"The 'flu shot'?! Ron, if you weren't deathproof, I would kill you for that!"

"Takeshi, put your fucking problems with my brand of overprotectiveness out the FUCKING WINDOW before I relieve you of duty!"

The bridge was silent, save for the sound of the consoles din. "…That was uncalled for. We're all on edge, and I've never had someone this important out of my reach for more than a day before."

"Yeah, I know," Takeshi replied. "It's just… Larcei's never been in danger quite like this before, either."

"I've got nothing, sir. Her implant must be offline."

Ron shook his head. "That's not possible. The damn thing's plated in tritanium and has a powercell that lasts for two decaaaades…oh, shit." Ron walked over to a wall and punched it, screaming his lungs out. "FUCKING ICONIAN BITCH! The chroniton capacitor in the gateway was damaged, wasn't it? It didn't just move her from one universe to another, it moved her from one TIME to another! It's a fucking Molly O'Brien disaster all over again!"

Jaden blinked, clearly out of the loop. "Uhhh… translation?" he asked, looking at Takeshi.

"Molly O'Brien is the daughter of Miles O'Brien, Chief Engineer of space station Deep Space 9 from 2369 to 2375," Takeshi explained. "In 2374, she fell into some kind of portal, and when she was retrieved, she'd apparently spent several years on that world, and had gone from an eight-year-old to an adult. Of course, they managed to get the eight-year-old Molly back eventually, but I don't think that'll happen in this case." He sighed. "I guess we managed to miss most of her childhood, huh? I just hope she grew up in safety…"

"Tell the _Hiroshima_ and _Torrens_ to take up positions and cloak the fleet. We're going in. Riza, full impulse. Set a course for Earth." He returned to his seat. "Yellow alert."

The trailing lights turned yellow, and the shields were raised. "Engage the cloak before we enter Earth orbit."

"Aye, sir."

"And prepare an escort. I'm going down there with Takeshi, Luna, and Jaden."

* * *

 **Earth, Skyranger Transport returning to XCOM HQ**

* * *

Tempest was seated in the crash webbing of the Skyranger again as her team returned to HQ. They'd brought down the statue with no problems, though a member of her team had been critically wounded by ADVENT Troopers.

According to reports, Gatecrasher had fared much worse, with both the rookies that had gone on the mission ending up dying. Bradford and operative Jane Kelly, however, had managed to secure the Package that Gatecrasher had gone to get, and were bringing it back to base.

She itched at her back, at her fifth thoracic vertebra. She'd been itching there for years, but there seemed to be no way to really relieve it.

It WAS fairly close, though.

* * *

 **Four hours earlier - New Berlin**

* * *

The old majesty of Berlin had been torn down, Brandenburg Gate replaced by a VERY gaudy statue of an Ethereal and every building replaced by Advent stock-white crap. The entire human race, degraded to nothing more than puppets.

Well, they were about to learn that these puppets had OTHER ideas and weren't dancing to the aliens' tune anymore.

The six XCOM soldiers scattered about the plaza, the team sharpshooter ascending a nearby building with help from an exterior pipe to provide overwatch as the rest of the team began approaching the statue.

Tempest herself was advancing from cover to cover, her light footfalls not drawing as much sound, keeping the troopers from noticing her as she passed bare feet behind them.

The inhuman troopers walked past, one looking directly at her position before moving on. She moved on, sticking to cover and dodging civilians who were loyal in their stupidity to Advent. She was tempted to do what her uncle would do, but that would dirty XCOM's good name.

So instead, she simply slipped past them.

Nearby, she could see her team's grenadier moving a bit slower and more carefully, lumbering along with that big cannon and grenade launcher of his as he moved to get a good flanking angle. She could also see the team medic and the team specialist moving up as a unit, the specialist's Gremlin Drone floating along behind them, one of Shen's new devices keeping the thing mostly invisible aside from a faint blue glow from its float units, barely visible even if you knew what to look for. Her team's other ranger was moving more cautiously, having trained more on CQC with his machete and shotgun than for stealth.

There were a few guards next to the statue itself - two Troopers and an Officer. Nothing Tempest and her team couldn't handle.

Tempest reached down to her belt pouch, confirming that the X4 Explosive Charge was there - every member of the team carried one. X4 was another of Shen's new inventions, an improvement of the old explosive C4 - just as stable, but more than triple the blast yield.

' _I have to hand it to Lily,_ ' she thought to herself as her gaze briefly drifted down to the pouch where the charge was. ' _She knows how to make just about anything, even a better bomb._ ' She focused her attention back to the statue. With her stealth training, odds were she'd be the one to plant the X4 while everyone else distracted or eliminated the enemy. After a moment to check over the positions of her team, she sent a triple-tap over the comm channel - their signal to engage.

Gunfire from SCAR-Ls, a single Tac-50 and an Itheca 37 sounded off, with an officer hitting the ground with a fist-sized hole in his face and a trooper was riddled with 5.56mm bullets and his counterpart was filled with buckshot.

Sometimes it had to be said that old-fashioned weapons were the best. Her father and uncle liked them, her father more then her uncle.

And nothing was more old-fashioned than the simple blade, as the other ranger in the group used his machete to chop an ADVENT Trooper down to size.

Tempest, meanwhile, used the distraction to run up to the statue, taking the X4 Charge from her belt pouch and placing it up against the base of the statue.

As Uncle Ron would say, 'I don't want bang, I want big BOOM'. And big boom there would be, if she had anything to say about it.

She cackled lightly to herself, her uncle's influence, though brief, very ingrained. She did enjoy this a LITTLE too much.

She turned around just in time for the other ranger to get a bullet through the back, as he crumpled to the ground. The medic was already moving to treat him, even as Larcei moved stealthily to the Trooper that had made the shot, Jaden-kun's utility knife popping into her hand. As the Trooper tried to line up another shot, she pulled him down into her cover and slipped the knife under the visor, popping it open to expose the semi-alien face before ramming the blade deep into the Trooper's cranium, killing it instantly.

" _Buster, this is Avenger: status._ "

"Mopping up enemy resistance now, Avenger: standby!"

Tempest used her own shotgun, this one a Benelli M1014 without its stock, to take out another trooper. Beyond a few screaming civilians, there was nothing left but corpses.

The new scientist, Tygan, would probably like one or two to look at. She always hated pickup duty.

"This is Central: we've got the package. Repeat, we have the package. Firebrand, move in to pick up Gatecrasher before swinging by to get Buster." Tempest looked up to the sky, seeing the new Skyranger fly overhead. A tilt-engine design, but again, not as efficient as more conventional craft.

Still, alien AG tech made that rather pointless, so they were allowed to make whatever the hell they wanted.

Thinking about that depressed her a little before the transport swung in. It reminded her of her family.

Her relatives were crazy, but they loved her. And she knew they wouldn't stop looking for her as Firebrand moved overhead, dropping ropes to recover the team.

* * *

The lights in the transport turned red as the rear hatch opened, shortly before the Skyranger landed harshly on its' skids. Bradford was the first out, carrying a stasis suit with someone inside; probably the Commander: they were almost obsessed about getting him back.

"Get him to medical, now!" A pair of XCOM NCOs took hold of the heavy suit, carrying it out. "Nice work out there, Tempest. The aliens know we're back in action now."

"Yeah. We'll have better support once the Commander's out of that thing, if he's in there."

Bradford knew his surrogate daughter too well to not notice her shift in mood. "What is it?"

"We'd have a greater chance if my parents were here. My Uncle would teach the bastards a lesson they'd never forget, too."

He indulged her, as he always did, telling her that it would. He had no idea how much she was right.

* * *

Showers of light signaled the arrival of a small away team, led by Takeshi and Luna, into a city area.

Jaden, meanwhile, this time wearing a modified personal shield instead of his armor to blend in, led XCOM's Alpha Team in the ghettos. He wasn't comfortable outside his armor, though, and it showed with his constant looking over his shoulder.

Although he was less mortified to be out of it when Luna unloaded two clips of 14.5mm rounds into it before Sonja fired a light phaser cannon at him before they left the ship.

The 'light' really just meant 'man-portable'; the damn thing was powerful enough to kill an elite with full shields!

He still didn't like not having the armor, and he kinda wanted to punch Sonja and Luna for shooting at him now.

"Isabelle, pull overwatch." Kelly ordered, as the Psionic sniper nodded - her Ghost armor flashing before she vanished from sight. "Let's move - let's see how this world's different from ours."

"Dropship incoming!" Shaojie warned, as an ADVENT dropship flew overhead, flying towards another part of the Ghetto.

" _Sir, Dropship is touching down - I've got eyes on those ADVENT guys,_ " Isabelle reported. " _And… fuck, those Sectoids are ugly as shit-wait, goddamnit, they're rounding up people!_ "

"Then we know where to start," Kelly said, nodding. "Let's get moving, people! Spartan, take point!"

"Got it sir," the Spartan nodded, before rushing forward ahead of the others.

It was only a quick run before they came across the sight - roughly six ADVENT Troopers and a pair of MUCH more ugly-looking Sectoids, lining up roughly a dozen people against the wall. The ADVENT speaking in a language that they couldn't understand.

"I don't like the look of this…" Isabella muttered. "Colonel?"

The Colonel nodded. "You know what to do," he said, looking at the hulking Shaojie. "Zhang? Tank 'em."

The chinese MEC Trooper smirked. "It's what I do," he said, pulling out his Plasma Cannon.

The ADVENT Troopers began to line up the civilians, the Commander speaking in the alien language as the troopers prepared their laser rifles - aimed at the civilians… but before the commander could issue the order, the ground began to shake, followed by the sound of a warcry as the Commander turned around just in time to watch a human/mech hybrid rush up to him - before punching his head clean off. The meaty **SPLAT** of the commander's head disintegrating around an armored fist echoed across the landscape. The sudden arrival caught the troopers off-guard - before the first Trooper had its own head blown off by plasma.

The armored troopers cried out in their own language, which, of course, they couldn't understand.

The Spartan and XCOM troops didn't give two fucks; they were working with the aliens, so that made them the enemy, and thus, to be shot. Repeatedly.

The civilians screamed in terror, but one paused. "Holy shit! You guys are XCOM!" Kelly was amused. They were famous. "Kick their asses! I remember the invasion! Bleed them dry!"

"Stay inside!" The Colonel warned, as the ADVENT Troops fell back behind cover. "We've got these guys!"

The Civilians nodded, taking cover inside the Ghetto building "Frag out!" Edwin shouted, the Support trooper tossing out a Grenade towards the ADVENT, the device detonating sending the troops flying.

Jaden fired his MA37, before he heard a familiar hissing sound, glancing as he saw one of the new Sectoids approach - its arm glowing with Psionic energy as it lashed out against Jaden…

….only for his Psionic-shield to block any attempt to mess with his head, as Jaden just pulled out his pistol and shot the Sectoid in the head without even looking. "That shit don't work with us," he growled.

"Come on, Spartan. We'll regroup with the civilians, get them to safety. Maybe our Starfleet friend will beam them up to his ship."

"H-hey!" The two looked as one of the Covies approached. "We-we can contact your base!"

Kelly rose an eyebrow. "You… can?" He asked.

"Yeah! We got the Comm package they sent to the ghetto's a while back," he said, pointing at a radio tower "We can call them there!"

Kelly glanced to Jaden, who shrugged. "Might as well," he said.

"Alright - get us a link." The colonel told the vivid, who nodded before hastily running to the building where the antenna was.

* * *

Adrian Sheridan grunted, walking the halls of the _Avenger_ with a cane in hand. It felt like only yesterday they were still fighting the aliens in the old base… Now all these years passed, and once again they were the underdogs: starting off at square one.

He stepped through another set of doors which lead to the bridge… Before alarms went off. " _Warning: unauthorized personnel on the bridge_."

He got several stares from the bridge personnel - including Bradford. Adrian sighed, smirking slightly as he rose his hands. "I surrender?" he asked.

Bradford chuckled slightly. "Glad to see your sense of humor hasn't changed," he remarked, before looking up. "Execute Echelon Protocol."

" _Attention: Senior Command Exchange confirmed,_ " came the voice of the computer.

"I wanted that to be a bit more… Ceremonious," he said as the Commander walked up to him. "But we have a situation… Hell I'm having a hard time believing this myself."

Adrian rose his brow. "What is it?" He asked.

"One of the ghettos we work with was compromised, and ADVENT sent a force to apprehend the people," he explained. "But we just got a message back. They say an XCOM team showed up, kicked the aliens asses."

"I'm guessing you didn't send anyone?" The commander asked.

"No… And definitely not a dead team." He informed, pressing a series of keys, before an image appeared on screen. Adrian looked… And damn near had a heart attack. The faces, the gear…

"Alpha?" he muttered. "But that's…"

"Impossible?" Bradford nodded. "Yeah, we know… Alpha was KIA when they attacked the base… But there they are… And they haven't aged a day."

"…you think it's a trick?"

Bradford sighed. "I...don't know. We know they died. But they know everything they knew: old codes, details… Hell they even knew about the coffee incident when I asked. If it's a trick… It's a damn elaborate one."

Adrian hummed in thought, looking at the picture once more. "… Where is Buster team?" He asked.

"They just recovered the device, and are RTBing," he said. "You want them to meet Alpha?"

"We have to be sure." Adrian sighed. "It may be fool's hope, but…"

"I know, sir. I'll send them out. They were the best we had. Let's get them back."

* * *

"Understood," Tempest replied. "We'll move out right away." The comm call ended, and she turned to her squad. "Alright, troops, we just got new orders - we're heading out again."

"AGAIN?!" the team's specialist asked. "We only just got that device back here! What do they want us to do now?"

"A contact mission," Tempest replied. "Apparently the old Alpha Squad is back from the grave, and we're going to pick them up."

' _Tou-san… Kaa-san… Uncle Ron… Jaden-kun… is it you?_ ' she asked herself in the confines of her mind.

She left the barracks, getting her gear before heading for the Skyranger, which was starting its' engines again. The craft never seemed to rest nowadays.

So when she boarded it, she expected never to return to the _Avenger_. Her family was waiting for her.

And no one fucked with Larcei Yamato's family.

* * *

 **City Center, City of New Berlin**

* * *

Takeshi, Luna, and the team with them made their way through the city center, quietly observing the townsfolk around them. All were wearing civilian clothes, with Takeshi also wearing sunglasses to hide his glowing eyes and a baseball cap, just in case the roots of his hair had begun turning white again.

Of course, he still had something rather conspicuous…

"I can't believe you brought your katana," Luna remarked.

"Hey, I still have a Phaser in case I need it," Takeshi replied. "And I know it stands out, but I've learned how to use my Psionics to just broadcast a feeling of harmlessness." And it seemed to be working - none of the civilians they passed were giving the team a second glance, even with the katana.

"Ron is going to hurt you later."

"Not if I hurt him first. I still owe him a beating for hacking into my private database."

"His entire body's laced with tritanium, and even if he lets you use that sword, he'll just use his shields to block it. They ARE built into his body, you know." That wasn't exactly fair to Takeshi, but he had ways around it.

"Well, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it," Takeshi remarked. "For now, let's just see about gaining intel."

"Mor Balaten!"

"I think the local idiot brigade's arrived, husband." The idiots were four ADVENT troopers and an officer, who had noticed them and were not happy to see Takeshi so armed. As such, they were approaching guns raised.

Against two Starfleet officers, they were no real threat. Against two of the _Ra Cailum's_ finest? They had NO threat level. If anything, they were the most dangerous things within 150 kilometers, and their captain topped the list as most dangerous thing on the planet.

"I do believe you're right," Takeshi replied. His Psionics alerted him to something in the shadows, as he spotted a semi-familiar shape behind the soldiers. "Looks like the new Sectoids are here, too. I'll deal with them while you take the idiots."

"You're the idiot with the sword. Why shouldn't I just shoot the damn things while you kill the troopers?"

"Because I can feel the Sectoids trying to get in my mind," Takeshi said with a slight growl. "Not that it's working, but it's really ticking me off."

"Then give me the sword."

"Not happening."

One of the troopers reached for Luna, but as any moron would know, Luna spent her entire life with Riza.

And Riza was a master of shredding people, both with a scythe and with her bare hands.

So she just grabbed the hand, twisted the arm out of its' socket and grabbed its' head before breaking its' neck.

Meanwhile, Takeshi drew his phaser and fired at the Sectoids, even as he closed to melee range.

And while the Sectoids weren't able to control him, he was able to pull a Tuvok, and use the link to see into their minds.

And he learned some things.

He was the reason the troopers had accosted them, yes, but not because of the sword. Apparently, Humanity in this universe had never awakened Psionics, even under ADVENT rule, even though the potential existed. So an active Psionic was an oddity they couldn't pass up the chance to analyze.

That ticked him off more, and he let out a war cry as he drew his sword, slicing one Sectoid in two from skull to crotch, even as he moved to attack another one, wielding his blade with one hand even as he fired his phaser with the other.

Luna used her own version of Riza's usual moves (those being breaking of necks, arms and other appendages) to kill a pair of idiots, but the last one pulled out a large paddle-shaped weapon that lit up.

"And this is why I wanted the sword." The trooper swung, but Luna blocked the blade, draining her shields to minimal levels before pulling out her own combat knife and shoving it into the lancer's brain. "Takeshi, would you HURRY UP?!"

"On it!" Takeshi yelled, as he beheaded the second Sectoid before blasting a third, then leaped back into the main brawl, sword swinging at the ADVENT troopers.

An officer went down with ease, and the rest scattered. "I wonder if Jaden and Ron are having more luck."

"Ron's probably putting the fear of God into them, Jaden's introducing them to fear. If anything, the morons should be calling in the bigger guns soon."

Takeshi chuckled. "Sounds about right. Anyway, let's see if we can find one of those gene therapy clinics - find out what their purported purpose is, and if there's any link to the ADVENT networks we can tap…"

* * *

Jaden adjusted his armor back on - the _Ra Cailum_ being kind enough to have it beamed down once he told them their cover was blown.

They were told XCOM was sending some help, however they also managed to get word from Cassie who told them they were going to have company. A LOT of company, with multiple dropships heading their way. So they started to hunker down - and waited for whichever came first: XCOM or ADVENT.

Jaden didn't like this at all. Larcei could be dead. The little girl could've been drafted into ADVENT's little monster army and he could have killed her today.

The guilt welled up inside as a drop ship came in, and from the black markings and emblems, as well as the unfriendly design, it wasn't XCOM. "Here they come!" He called out, raising his rifle.

The doors to the first Dropship slid open, as two ADVENT troopers dropped out, plus an officer and a large ADVENT robot.

Stark white and bearing the same markings. Yeah, it needed to die. And so Jaden opened fire, the 7.62mm bullets not entirely penning the armor, but the gun arm was disabled before the rest of the ADVENT forces noticed, unprepared for the ambush Alpha was laying for them.

Next up, Zhang made his presence known as the MEC Trooper slammed into the ADVENT Mech, using the rocket-punch feature of his MEC to punch the head off of the robot, before kicking it back. He whirled around as he kicked another ADVENT Trooper, before aiming his cannon and fired at an Officer - the plasma roasting the Officer's corpse before it hit the ground. The last troop tried to run, but didn't go far before another plasma bolt from the rooftops arced into its head - another clean kill from Isabella.

"These guys aren't so tough!" Zhang shouted, as he smashed the boot of his MEC armor into the downed ADVENT robot.

" _Don't celebrate yet - more incoming!_ " The Colonel warned, and sure enough five more dropships made their approach towards them, moving low as their hatches opened - letting another batch of ADVENT Troops out, along with several aliens. Jaden activated his suit's built-in binoculars, and got a good look at some of the new aliens… including some that looked like King Cobra's.

"The aliens just keep getting _uglier_ ," he muttered.

The cobra extended its' tongue, only for Jaden to catch it and cut it off before it could grab him.

The snake was understandably pissed off. The Spartan failed to care as he unloaded AR rounds into its' head, killing it. "This stopped being entertaining a while back!" An officer gestured at Jaden's position, attempting to mark him as a priority target.

' _Amateurs,_ ' Jaden rolled his eyes, reloading his rifle as he prepared for the next wave of enemies.

* * *

" _Holy hell it's a fucking warzone down there!_ "

Firebrand's comment was not untrue, as the loading bay doors of the Skyranger II opened, and revealed the Ghetto had transformed into an all-out war zone. Buildings and cars on fire, ADVENT Dropships crashed to the ground, it wasn't anything like the XCOM soldiers had seen before… save for Larcei.

Her attention was drawn to one figure in particular - a rather tall one that she recognized instantly, even though the last time she saw it was eighteen years previous. "Jaden-kun…" she whispered.

"Wait, that's the guy you've been talking about?" Jane Kelly, who had taken the place of the team's other Ranger while he recovered from his injuries, asked. "The guy you care about?"

"Yeah," Larcei replied. She knew he probably still cared about her like a sister, but the past eighteen years had caused her to look at her feelings differently… and she'd realized she'd fallen in love with the Spartan. "And that means Tou-san, Kaa-san, and Uncle Ron are here, too."

"Wait, isn't the last one the overprotective semi-genocidal one you mentioned?"

Larcei smiled in a way her aunt and uncle would be proud of. That disturbed the rest of the team.

"We're all going to die."

"Someone is," Larcei replied, before turning to the cockpit. "Firebrand, we're ready to drop!"

"Understood!" the pilot replied, opening the hatch. "You're clear to drop! Good luck, Buster!"

Larcei smiled, and jumped out the open hatch, grabbing a cable and sliding down to the ground, throwing her utility knife at an ADVENT Stun Lancer that was trying to come at Jaden from behind.

Jaden pointed his sidearm at the Lancer - having saw him coming via the motion tracker, before he realized a knife was already imbedded into the back of its skull. Looking towards where it came from, he spotted a squad of individuals wearing armor bearing the markings of XCOM on them.

"Colonel, XCOM's here!" Jaden said, as he pulled the knife out of the Stun Lancer. "We should-" his voice hitched as he looked at the knife. To anyone else it would seem to be a standard issue combat knife… but along the side, there was a symbol of an eagle, with the letters U.N.S.C. engraved along the handle. But more importantly, the blade had engravings upon it…

This was _his_ knife… the one he gave to Larcei.

The XCOM team approached him - the leading female walked up to him, smiling… why did she seem so-

Before she could talk, a tongue lashed out and grabbed her, she yelped in surprise as a Viper dragged her towards it - coiling around her.

That was a mistake, as Jaden fired the M6G at the snake, the ADVENT alien screeching before Jaden took Emile's kukri and shoved it into the reptilian being's skull. He yanked off the Viper - pulling the woman out of its coils. "Are you alright?"

Larcei looked into the visor of Jaden's Starfleet-built MJOLNIR armor, trying not to blush before nodding. "I'm fine." Her eyes widened as she pulled up her M4 Super 90. "Look out!" He quickly moved out of the way, allowing her to fire and for the 12-gauge shell to kill another lancer that didn't get the message.

"…Seriously, what is _with_ those guys?" Jaden muttered. "And I thought Takeshi was stupid running in with _just_ a sword. I keep killing these guys and they just don't get the message." He didn't notice Larcei's eye twitch. "Anyways, I think it's time we got the hell out of here before more of these guys show up."

Larcei eagerly nodded before putting her finger to her ear. "Firebrand, swing in for pickup! We're getting the hell out of here!"

The VTOL swung in, putting down briefly as it opened its' rear hatch. " _Come on! Let's go!_ "

"Go, go, go!" Colonel Kelly shouted, as Alpha Squad headed out with the civilians - making a mad dash for the Skyranger II. The XCOM team and Jaden also followed suit, as they quickly loaded up on the dropship.

"Firebrand, GO!" Larcei shouted.

" _We're going, we're going!_ " The pilot retorted, as the craft began to rise back up into the air just as more ADVENT forces began to show up. The craft flew away, heading back to the _Avenger_.

As Alpha and the others relaxed, Jaden looked at the knife he had recovered. "So… whose knife is this?" he asked. "Because I have an important question for them."

"Mine," Larcei replied as she turned to Jaden. "What do you want to ask?"

Jaden's eyes narrowed slightly, facing the woman - presenting the knife. "I gave this knife to a three-year old girl," he informed. "And I'm looking for her… tell me, _where_ did you find this?"

Larcei smiled. "I got it from you, actually," she said. "Granted, it was eighteen years ago by my reckoning… good to see you again, Jaden-kun."

Jaden's eyes widened behind his helmet - which he removed to get a better look at her… older? Yes, but the hair, the eyes, the face… "…Larcei?"

She nodded. "Yes, it's me," she said. "I'm… I'm really glad to see you again, Jaden-kun…"

The Spartan said nothing… but a moment later, Larcei eeped slightly as she found herself in his embrace. "Y-you're… alive…" he muttered, tears steadily welling up. "You're… L-Larcei, I'm… s-so sorry…"

"H… hey, why are you apologizing?" Larcei asked, even as she began to tear up slightly, as well. "It… it's not your fault that I ended up here…"

"Yes it is…" he said, shaking his head. "I… I promised I'd protect you… k-keep you safe, but I… I couldn't…"

Larcei rubbed Jaden's back soothingly… or tried to through his armor, at least. "Hey, come on, it's alright…" she told him. "I don't blame you for that, Jaden-kun… the blame for that falls on T'ket for abducting me in the first place, and on that guy who shot the gate and caused it to malfunction… I'm guessing he was a humanoid Cylon. You didn't do anything wrong…"

"I should've been… faster, or… or something," Jaden shook his head. "Now, you're…" he looked at Larcei again, and chuckled bitterly. "Now you're… well you're not… "

"I'm not that little three-year-old girl you knew anymore…" Larcei said with a slight chuckle. "You're still the same Spartan… the same _man_ I care about, though… and I'd be happy to help you get to know me again…"

Jaden sniffed a bit. "Yeah, I… I guess we've got some… well, catching up to do…" he admitted.

"That we do…" Larcei replied. "And I need to introduce you to some of the friends I've made here, like Lily."

The Spartan nodded. "Looking forward to it… Larcei," he said, before the two sat down next to one another.

Larcei smiled. She was glad to have met Jaden once more, and seeing his face had confirmed what she'd figured out three years ago - she no longer cared for him like a brother, but had fallen in love with him.

Hopefully he would fall in love with her, as well, and soon…

* * *

 **117Jorn: LARCEI LIVES! :D**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Thanks to the Cylon that shot that gate, though, she's much older than she was before… and has become quite the badass during those intervening years.**

 **Ron the True Fan: (Pulls out twin MG42s with Doppeltrommel magazines) Well, you know what happens next…**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Yup. *Word RAPE appears in large white letters***

 **117Jorn: Stay tuned for next time, until then…**

 **Ja Ne!**


	21. Chapter 21

**Time/Date: May 15th, 2035**

 **Location: Earth, San Francisco**

* * *

A lone man walked down the streets of the bay city, avoiding looking at the people or troopers. Of course, he was more dangerous than anyone within 500 kilometers.

Ronald Pinkerton sighed, cursing in Klingon and Andorian. The home of Starfleet Headquarters looked like someone tore into the city and pulled a Wolfenstein. He was TWO steps from going on a killing spree, which is why the escorts went with Takeshi and Lunamaria.

He wanted to limit any potential friendly fire. A red scanning beam passed over Ron's body as he walked under a lamppost, which sent out alarms, alerting a squad of Advent troopers and a MEC. "Mor Balaten!"

Ron raised an eyebrow. "Buddy, I'm two steps from hurting someone. Be smart and fuck off."

" _On your knees! NOW_!" The officer slammed his rifle into the Starfleet captain's gut, but cybernetics combined with a layer of fat made the blow pointless, much to the confusion of the officer.

"You have ONE more chance. Piss off, or die. Your choice." A lancer pointed its' rifle at his head and pulled the trigger, a gauss round exiting the barrel and entering Ron's head.

Or would have, had Ron's shields and tritanium-reinforced skeleton not stopped it.

"No more chances. Time for you all to die." He grabbed the lancer's rifle, positioning the alien to have the asshole's back touching his chest before quickly forcing the lancer to shoot his comrades one by one before breaking his neck.

* * *

 **Meanwhile - with Takeshi and Luna**

* * *

"Clinic should be just up ahead," Takeshi said, as they approached one of the gene therapy clinics. However doing so, they passed by a large T.V. set up on display, which broadcasted an emergency report.

" _This just in, from New San Francisco: there appears to be some type of disturbance in the area._ " The reporter said, giving the two Starfleet officers pause as they looked at the screen. " _Reports are flooding in that a group of men are harassing and assaulting ADVENT soldiers-_ " she paused as she held an earpiece. " _Excuse me?_ " she asked. " _Just… one? Err, correction it seems to just be… one man…_ "

Takeshi and Luna looked at the screen, looked at each other, and facepalmed in unison. "Dammit, Ron." the two muttered as one.

The footage showed as Ron slaughtered the Advent idiots, before the MEC tried to step on him. But Ron was too fast, and jumped onto the machine before ripping its' head off.

" _All citizens are instructed to avoid this… individual at all costs._ "

"We should have seen THIS coming."

Takeshi groaned in agreement. "Yeah, and NOW Ron's on a—"

* * *

RAMPAAAAAAGE!

(BGM: Rampage! by Miracle Of Sound - GTA5 Trevor tribute song)

The ADVENT Troopers fired at Ron, who simply let them hit. The troopers looked at their weapons before retreating. VERY quickly.

" _Ra Cailum_ , this is Pinkerton: send down the Buzzsaw Package." A shower of light signalled the arrival of a bandolier of magazines, his sword and the buzzsaws of the Buzzsaw Package: a pair of MG42s with Doppeltrommel magazines fit to them. The Package included 16 added dual-drum mags, meaning Ron was NOT running out of ammo ANY TIME soon.

He fit the sword to his belt, then clipped the extra mag belt over his jacket before picking up both weapons and cocking them.

ADVENT Troopers were still keeping their distance, but their ranks were being bolstered by aliens: Sectoids, Vipers, and even Mutons, which, like the Sectoids, seemed to have the influence of human DNA in their makeup now.

"You all came here just for little ol' me? I'm touched. You're all still going to DIE, though." He took up a duelling shooter's stance, his right shoulder facing the enemy before opening fire with the right MG42, proving why they were called 'Hitler's Buzzsaws' by tearing into the sectoids and making a few well-placed headshots on the troopers, pausing fire to advance.

* * *

"Great to have you back, boys." Bradford spoke to Alpha squad, Buster, and Jaden as they entered the bridge. "Though I'd like to know how the hell you're-"

"Bradford?"

"Commander?"

"…Do we have any demigods in San Francisco?"

Bradford was confused… before he saw what the Commander - and the bridge staff - were looking at, as a single man was _dual-wielding machine guns_ and unleashing a hailstorm of bullets on an endless horde of ADVENT soldiers, aliens and Mech's. "What… the… hell…?"

"Uncle Ron!" Bradford and Sheridan both looked at Larcei, who was clapping her hands together. "I TOLD you making my uncle mad was a bad idea!"

Both men watched as 'Ron' let go of both weapons, jumping on top of a muton and _breaking its' neck_.

Which even MECs had trouble doing! "He's slaughtering them. He's on a goddamned rampage."

"Be glad he's doing it to ADVENT and the aliens," Larcei remarked. "They must have done something stupid - like try to kill him."

The troopers slowly backed away, but the man tore into them like the aliens tore into XCOM during the base attack 20 years prior.

"Ooooh, he's REALLY mad." A MEC swung at him, be he climbed up and did… something that caused it to stop before he hacked a lancer IN HALF with his sword and fired his MG42 at an officer.

"What did he do to that robot?"

"He must have assimilated it," Larcei remarked off-hand. "He **_is_** an ex-Borg Drone, after all."

Adrian's eyes widened at that. "Did… did you say Borg?" he asked.

Larcei nodded. "The you I met in the other universe was a Trekkie, as well, I remember," she said. "Yes, it's real, yes, it's where I'm from, and yes, Ron is an ex-Drone, but the cybernetics they put in him couldn't be removed, so he makes do."

Adrian looked at Larcei, then back at the screen - and then back to Larcei. "…starship?"

"USS _Ra Cailum_ , _Odyssey_ -class."

Adrian looked back at the screen… and for the first time in a _very_ long time, he let out a face-splitting grin. "Oh, fucking A!"

The MEC started moving and shooting at Mutons before the rifle fired green bolts of energy. "Disruptors. He turned the damn thing into a disruptor rifle!" Another MEC engaged the Ron-MEC, but it kicked the Advent MEC before sticking it with a tubule, and it shut down before moving against the alien forces.

Tygan watched with morbid fascination. "Remarkable. If we could use that same—"

"NO!"

The scientist looked at Sheridan, Bradford, Jaden, and Larcei, who interrupted him. "Why not?"

"Borg technology is a BAD IDEA!" Larcei said. "The only reason my uncle's using it is because he can control it!"

"Tygan - in _Star Trek_ , just about anyone who messes with Borg tech has a very BAD ending," Adrian shook his head. "I am _not_ risking it."

The scientist deflated before Ron looked at the camera, smirking darkly.

Lily backed away. "He… he scares the shit out of me."

"He has that effect on most people, Lily," Larcei remarked. "Only a few people **_don't_** get scared of him." After a moment, she blinked. "Oh, right, I have to introduce you!" She grabbed Jaden and pulled him alongside her. "Lily, this is Jaden. Jaden, this is one of my best friends in this universe, and XCOM's current chief engineer, Lily Shen."

"Oh! Umm… hello," Lily said, looking at the rather tall human standing in front of her… and handsome. ' _Where did THAT come from?_ ' "Y-Yeah, I'm Lily…"

"Nice to meet you," Jaden smiled, nodding. "Thank you for being with Larcei, after all this time… it's only been a week for us, but here… "

"It's fine, really! If anyone should be thanked, it's Central! He's been looking after her since the invasion."

Bradford winced. "Are your… parents going to be as mad as your uncle when they find out where you've been?"

"No, they'll be happy to see I'm alright." She said, "In fact, my uncle might just give you an honorary Starfleet commission."

Bradford was confused by that. The angry son of a bitch tearing ADVENT a new hole, pleased with him? "Why?"

"You protected me," Larcei smiled. "He's big on family, so that makes you an honorary member of his own!"

"Bradford - don't question it," Adrian said, watching the video. "Let's just try and NOT piss of the guy who can-HOLY SHIT, HE JUST FLIPPED THAT CAR!"

"Eh, he's flipped over runabouts," Larcei remarked. "That thing's nothing."

The ADVENT troops broke ranks, but Ron was NOT letting them go. He was going to kill them. ALL of them.

"Look, I love seeing ADVENT getting its ass handed to it as much as the next guy," Adrian said, as Ron ripped a Sectoid in half _with his bare hands_. "… _but_ he's drawing WAY too much attention, and there is still a chance civilians might get caught up in all this… "

"Hang on," Jaden pulled up his commbadge. "Yo Ron, having fun in San Francisco?" On the screen they could see Ron pause as he answered.

" _Spartan. Anything to report?_ " He fired a single bullet into a trooper's head, allowing the MECs to do all the work for him.

"Well, I've got good news, better news, and bad news." Jaden informed. "Good news: we've contacted XCOM of this universe. Better news-"

"Hi, Uncle Ron!" Larcei called out.

He paused for a moment before his voice came through, though his mouth wasn't moving. " _LARCEI?!_ "

"You always complained about a running tally." She said, giggling slightly, "I didn't figure out it was my parents having sex and you walking in on them until a few—"

" _Don't finish that sentence, young lady; we're taking you home! NOW!_ "

"Wait, wait! I'm needed here!" Larcei said hurriedly. "I'm a member of XCOM!"

" _Your parents are going to be PISSED. And we're not staying; you know DAMN well we don't belong here!_ "

"Maybe not, but I've been here eighteen years!" Larcei told him. "Bradford practically raised me! I have good friends here! We owe it to them to help bring down ADVENT and liberate Earth from alien rule!"

" _Is Commander Sheridan there?_ "

The commander in question spoke up for the first time since Jaden contacted Ron. "Uh, yes, but shouldn't you be… not in public?"

" _I'm not TALKING, commander,_ " Ron said. " _You're a Trekkie, you know the Borg. Think._ "

Sheridan blinked. "You still have the neural transceiver in your spine."

" _Good work; you get a gold star for the_ blatantly obvious _. ADVENT doesn't have subspace comms; they can't intercept this. I'll give you the same deal I gave the XCOM in the OTHER universe: 22nd Century Starfleet technology. And the same warning. Abuse it, I_ **end you** _. I'll mop up here, then beam to your location._ **Pinkerton out** _!_ "

With that, Ron started moving again, except FAR more aggressively.

And he was pretty fucking aggressive BEFORE!

"He must have turned off his Aggression Inhibitor," Larcei remarked.

"Aggression inhibitor?!"

"Yeah, he has something to help him keep from just killing everything in sight. Sometimes they just turn it off for… well…" A Muton was backed into a corner before Ron jumped onto it.

What followed is barely appropriate for an **M** -rated fic, let alone a **T** -rated one. Just know it was REALLY graphic.

"…Ok, first rule: DON'T PISS HIM OFF!" Adrian shouted. "EVER!"

"A very wise decision," Jaden nodded, glancing at Lily. "So… Larcei said something about you being an engineer? What do you make?"

Lily grinned. "Follow me."

* * *

 **New Berlin**

* * *

Takeshi, Luna, and their team now stood outside a gene therapy clinic - they weren't sure if it was the same one that the broadcasts had been talking about, the one that had been raided, but it seemed like a good place to get some answers.

"OK, looks like we've found our target," Takeshi remarked. "OK, remember, we're here to see what they do at this place, both what they say they do and what they actually do, and to see if we can connect to the ADVENT network. You all ready?"

"Yes, sir."

"You know it."

Takeshi forced the door open, scaring the woman at the front desk. "P-please don't hurt me! I only work here!"

Luna rolled her eyes in annoyance. "Then hide under the desk and shut the fuck up! You cause trouble, you WILL be hurt! But put your head in the sand, and we won't do ANYTHING? CLEAR?!"

She screamed and hid under her desk.

"You're starting to remind me of your stepmother."

Luna smiled at her husband. "Thank you."

"That wasn't a compliment; your stepmother scares the crap out of me." Takeshi shuddered a bit from memories, before the team entered the clinic. "OK, we need a computer terminal."

The woman reached out and pushed the Terminal on the front desk towards them - still hiding underneath it.

"Thank you," Takeshi replied, before he began going to work.

* * *

 **Thirty Minutes Later**

* * *

They'd found what they were looking for, alright.

They just wished they hadn't.

On the official side, the gene therapy clinics were supposedly there to fix defects and cure illnesses, and for the most part, they did just that.

Of course, Takeshi had remarked that it sounded too good to be true.

It was.

A bit of hacking had revealed a dark secret: Anyone who came in for treatment had their DNA scanned. Mostly it was so the aliens had a map of the Human Genome which they could use to improve their soldiers, hence the changes to the Sectoids and Mutons.

However, if someone's DNA matched the profile for some kind of project codenamed: Avatar, then the person was quietly abducted, and shipped… somewhere. Where, they didn't know yet.

"Get this information transmitted by to the _Ra Cailum_ ," Takeshi ordered. "And call Ron. If he's not pissed off already, he's going to be conducting mass murder after he hears about this."

His commbadge chirped before he tapped it. "Yamato."

" _Takeshi, I want you back on the_ Ra Cailum _. We've found Larcei, but there's a wrinkle._ "

Speak of the asshole, and he shall appear. "That's not the only wrinkle…"

" _Spit it out, Take. I'm pissed off enough as is._ "

"The aliens are still abducting people," Takeshi informed. "Under the guise of curing diseases, they've been mapping the human genome to improve their soldiers, and abducting anyone whose DNA matches the criteria for some kind of 'Avatar Project'."

The silence was a bad sign. When Ron got mad, he was vocal. THIS was new.

" _…If you'll excuse me, I have a bunch of motherfuckers to_ **SHOVE ONTO FLAGPOLES!** _Get our girl back!_ **PINKERTON OUT!** "

Takeshi flinched at the yelling from his brother-in-law. Clearly, his aggression inhibitor was offline.

"Alright, people, we should get going," Takeshi remarked, before tapping his combadge again as the team exfiltrated into an alley, taking all the data they could get from the systems. "Yamato to Jaden, status?"

" _I'm at XCOM's mobile base - some mobile airship,_ " Jaden informed. " _Sending coordinates now - beam on over here… got a surprise for ya._ "

Takeshi nodded. "Ron wants us back on the ship, but I think a little detour wouldn't be too bad." He tapped his combadge twice. "Yamato to _Ra Cailum_. Six to beam to Jaden's position."

"Seven," Luna remarked.

"Seven?" Takeshi asked.

Luna pointed to where the receptionist had followed them into the Alley.

Takeshi used his Psionics to briefly scan her mind - she'd been horrified by what she'd heard them talking about regarding the aliens, and she wanted out.

He nodded. "Right," he said. " _Ra Cailum_ , make that _seven_ to beam to Jaden's coordinates. Energize when ready."

The away team and their guest disappeared, with the latter covering her face in fear.

* * *

Sheridan was surprised to see seven people beam directly into the command center. "Commander Sheridan, Commander Takeshi Yamato." The Starfleet commander said, "My commanding officer is… mad, so he'll be joining us shortly."

"No shit!" Adrian said, pointing at the TV screen "That man tore into ADVENT like it was paper! What did the Borg DO to him?"

"Removed 70% of his vital organs, including half of his brain, replacing them with cybernetic components, lacing his bones with tritanium…" Takeshi listed off. His gaze then fell on a woman standing near Jaden, with his shade of hair and eye color, but with Luna's face… "L… Larcei…?"

She smiled. "Hi… Tou-san… Kaa-san…"

Takeshi did a brief probe with his Psionics… and then enfolded the woman in a hug, Luna following shortly thereafter. "LARCEI!" they both cried. "Oh god, baby, you're safe!"

Bradford winced before another shower of light appeared, depositing Ron in all his murderous glory. He had removed the MG42s and was now wearing a First Contact Starfleet uniform instead of civilian clothing. "Central Officer Bradford. A pleasure to see you again, though from your perspective, it's our first meeting."

"Uh… Captain…"

Ron rolled his eyes. "If you're worried about me doing to you what I did to ADVENT, don't. You're not stupid enough to shoot at me." He gestured to the young woman hugging her parents. "And you took care of Larcei. So XCOM is exempt. Where's Sheridan?"

"Right here," Sheridan said, waving. "Though I've only just gotten back… I was… held captive by the aliens ever since they attacked XCOM HQ 20 years ago."

"No wonder you lost," Ron said. "I've instructed my chief engineer to begin construction of something… a little better than this." Ron gestured to the _Avenger_.

"Like?"

"NX-Class cruiser, circa 2160. Photonic torpedoes, polarized hull, shields, phase cannons, the works."

Adrian grinned. "Oh, that will be _perfect_ ," he said.

Ron looked over to find Larcei hugging her parents before he rubbed the top of her head. "Hello, Larcei."

"Uncle Ron! …You were mad."

"I had every right and you know it. I'm happy to see that you're alright now."

Ron glanced at Sheridan. "I want a full briefing of your situation: resources, weapons, personnel." He glanced around. "Speaking of whom, where's Vahlen? I need to smack her upside the head."

"We don't know," Bradford replied. "She disappeared after the attack. Dr. Richard Tygan is our science officer now."

"Shame. She was an idiot, but a smart one. And Dr. Shen? I presume his ass is currently missing?"

Lily angrily walked up to Ron, anger overriding survival. "My father fought long and hard!" she shouted. "This ship is his legacy! Don't you DARE insult him!"

Ron leaned forward, glaring into her eyes. "And do not presume that I was insulting him," he said. "If he weren't loyal to XCOM, I would have asked him to join us. He would have made a HELL of a Starfleet engineer."

At that moment, Lily remembered who she was talking to.

The walking, talking murder machine.

"Um… uh… sorry about that…" Lily replied. "But… no, he's not missing, he's… gone…"

"Shame. I presume you're his replacement?"

Lily nervously nodded. "Lily Shen. Sir."

Takeshi covered his ears before Ron bellowed.

"SONJA!"

" _Yeah, yeah, boss, I'm on my way down._ "

"You two are going to have a LOT of fun."

"He's right, Lily," Larcei said. "You are." She then said to Ron, "Also, try to be a little more considerate around her, alright? Lily and I practically grew up together here. She's my best friend in this universe."

"Y-yeah, we're… like, almost sisters." Lily said, rather sheepishly, looking between Larcei's parents and her uncle.

Takeshi smiled. "Nice to meet a friend of Larcei's," he told her. "Thank you for helping take care of her while she was separated from us."

"My pleasure, Commander." Another shower signalled the arrival of the _Ra Cailum_ 's chief engineer, and third biggest bitch on board.

Cassie and Luna took second and first, respectively.

"Suh'prise, motherfuckers!"

"Everyone, Sonja Henderson, our chief engineer. Shen, you'll be working with her." Ron smirked. "And probably worshipping her by the end of the day…"

Lily scoffed. "I doubt that."

Larcei smirked. "Wanna put money on that?"

* * *

 **Main Engineering - Later**

* * *

Lily's jaw was agape as she handed Larcei over the cash, as she watched the Starfleet Engineer go to work in her own field… and absolutely dominating every last project she had. Sonja was able to improve the power rating and hover systems of the XCOM GREMLIN Drones, and didn't stop there as she started building several _more_ variants of the Drones on the side.

"The new drones have superior computer processing, partial EM shielding to negate some small arms fire, and I expanded it slightly to include a small 4mm machine gun with 200 rounds. Not enough to do much more then piss off a muton, but sectoids and lightly-armored troops will learn to fear it. Magnetic field coils are better and to be honest, I could lift Captain Pinkerton with it."

"And Uncle Ron weighs 310 pounds, so it can lift anybody outside heavy body armor."

Sonja grinned. "And that was with the scraps YOU had laying around. Imagine this shit with 22nd Century Starfleet shit in it."

Lily's jaw was practically on the floor. But she had only one thought in mind. "Take me with you."

"Huh?"

"After we deal with the aliens, when you head out for your next… well, stop," Lily explained, before repeating, "Take me with you. I wish to learn from the masters!"

"Well, that was—" The drone began going haywire, flying around the room. "The fuck?"

" _Pinkerton to Henderson: there's a tight-beam transmission coming in to your location._ "

Lily looked at Larcei for an explanation. "He can pick up things like that with his spinal comm system. This is Larcei: the drone's going crazy!"

" _Get it under control! Now!_ "

Lily was about to do something, before it hovered over by the screens - which suddenly began to display data on them. "Working on it…" She said, "This isn't right… someone triggered your remote uplink… but that's not possible, no one knows these systems." Sonja coughed. "You're an exception."

" _Shen! Power readings just spiked - what the hell is going on-_ " Bradford began, before the comms shut off with the lights - save for the monitors, which displayed a series of codes.

Lily's eyes widened - she _knew_ those codes… and the only other person who would know them was… "…Dad?"

"The fuck? Your dad is dead."

"Yeah, but-! We have to go and check this out! If my father's alive—"

Sonja shoved something into Lily's hands to shut her up. It was a type-2 phaser, circa 2293. "I'm going with you. You need someone better to deal with this shit, and I've got personal shields. Not to the degree the boss does, but I'm just as bulletproof."

"I'll go, too," Larcei added, putting a hand on Lily's shoulder. "You've been there for me all this time… now it's time for me to be there for you."

Lily nodded, tears coming to her eyes as she thought about how her surrogate sister was doing so much for her, and starting to feel a bit… more… for her. "Al… alright…" she said. "Thank you… Larcei…"

"I'm going too," Jaden said, looking at Larcei. "Soldier or not, I am _NOT_ letting you out of my sight, Larcei."

Larcei smiled, blushing a bit. "Works for me," she said. "Glad to have you with us, Jaden-kun."

* * *

"Run the scans again. This doesn't make sense." Ron walked over to the sensors post, curious. "Sup?" Bradford looked at the UFP captain, shuddering briefly. "That's what we're trying to find out. We've getting a message on an XCOM frequency, but there's no one in the field."

"Play it. I'll make some sense of it." They replayed the message, their ears only getting static.

But Ron's brain made sense of it. "That dumb cunt. She really DID need Sheridan to control her." Bradford looked at Ron. "What?"

"It's Vahlen. Seems she bit off more than she could chew." Ron sighed. "If you send a team, I'm going. If only to mock the stupid bitch."

"Vahlen…" Bradford muttered, before he nodded "Alright, but I'm going too. If she's alive, we need her back here."

"Pinkerton to _Ra Cailum_ : launch the _Ra-Horakhty_." He looked at Bradford before he could object. "You've only got the one Skyranger, and I'm not beaming a team in there. We're taking my shuttle."

"I can live with that. Packing those machine guns?"

"Hell no. I'm taking my compression rifle."

"Trust me: it's overpowered as it is!" Adrian called from his spot on the bridge. "Good luck, Bradford!"

"Why do I get the feeling I'm regretting this?"

"Regretting what, me coming with you or you not sleeping with Vahlen?" Bradford choked as Ron chuckled and left the command deck.

* * *

The Skyranger was lifted to the top deck as a sight Larcei was long since missing entered view.

It was ancient, but it was beautiful. The _Ra-Horakhty_ swung in, landing on the _Avenger_ before Ron and Bradford, as well as another team, exited the mobile base. "Central? Where are you going?"

"To deal with a dumbass German scientist!" Ron shouted. "They picked up a distress call from Vahlen, and I need to smack a bitch!"

Larcei shook her head. "Where's the uncle that DIDN'T curse?"

"You were three! This is me to everyone above 12!"

"Still, Uncle Ron, I'd appreciate it if you watched your language around me," Larcei told him.

Jaden shrugged. "I'd do it, Ron," he said with a chuckle. "Kinda hard to say No to her, you know."

Ron made a 'meh' face and waved it off before climbing into his personal shuttle. Bradford followed him before screaming something about the shuttle being empty.

"What was that about?"

"Oh, Cassie probably flew it down on autopilot. Guess no one's used to that." Jaden himself had to agree with Bradford.

Because if he was on a shuttle without a pilot, he'd freak the fuck out, too.

"Well, aint no rest for the wicked," Jaden said, as a Pelican dropship followed the _Ra-Horakhty_ in, its loading bay opening up. "Come on, this should get us over there without needing to move _Avenger_."

Larcei nodded "Right, let's go!"

* * *

The shuttle landed on the rocks, rear end facing the cave. "Central, this is Tygan: we are picking up massive psionic signatures and heat patterns inside the cave."

Ron rolled his eyes as he activated his compression rifle. "Really, thought that was plainly obvious, smart man." Bradford sent Ron a warning glare as he set his HK416 on the ground to pick up a datapad.

"What do we have here…" He muttered, as the datapad activated.

" _…the data must be preserved at all costs!_ " A voice said, one familiar to both Ron and Bradford… and sounding very panicked. " _You must hurry! Take this and find Bradford!_ "

Bradford sighed "It's her… but her friend didn't make it to the evac point."

" _I had hoped to meet my predecessor under less…. Extreme circumstances._ " Tygan said on the comms. " _Still, I managed to track her signal to an area just ahead in the cavern._ "

"Good," Bradford said, handing the pad to Ron. "I'm guessing you can decrypt the data?"

"Is the Pope Catholic?" The Ex-Borg said, snatching it from his grasp before plugging it in. "Hmm… well, bit degraded… this might take time to piece together. Might as well head on forward."

Central nodded, as the two headed forward along with the rest of the XCOM team. However as they moved forward, they noticed the… decorations.

"Burning stakes with human skulls," the Captain mused. "I'd've used a few paintings, personally. Less foreboding."

Bradford looked at Ron, fixing him with the 'WTF is wrong with you' look. "We're going into a dangerous situation, and you're making jokes?!"

"PLEASE." Ron rolled his eyes. "I'm practically death-proof, so I can afford to make jokes." Hissing was heard, and Bradford had the rest of the squad stop while Ron kept moving.

"Captain, you should stop!" A white form shot out from one of the cracks in the cave wall, heading for Ron.

It was quickly hacked in half in the blink of an eye by Ron's overly-sharp sword, which was quickly resheathed. "See? The only people you need to worry about are the rest of your team. I can handle myself."

Bradford groaned, before he looked at the corpse Ron had just created. "Vipers… why did it have to be Vipers?" he muttered.

"Quit with the Indiana Jones shit," Ron said, looking it over. "Hmm… looks different from the Vipers we've encountered before. Almost underdeveloped, like an earlier stage of growth…a precursor organism?" He scanned it with his tricorder. "Definitely weaker though." His head perked. "Ah, got the first bit decrypted - playing on the radio."

There was a sound of coughing " _Testing… system dictation, this is Doctor M. Vahlen - initial entry. It has taken me longer than I'd care to admit, but the secondary power systems is finally operational. Enough so I can continue on to more compelling work. While attempting to salvage materials from what appeared to be a totally inert storage system, I made an astonishing discovery. A single cryostasis unit remained intact and occupied…. This changes everything._ "

"Not sure I like the sound of that…" Bradford muttered, as they headed deeper inside.

"Oh, yes." Ron looked around, his cybernetic eye modified to pick up abnormal IR signatures. "Vahlen's smacking is going to be WELL deserved."

Another albino viper shot out before Ron simply shot it. "Move up; I'll warn you if there's any real trouble coming our way."

"And how would that be?"

"Cybernetic eye that can see through solid rock, maybe? Or the tricorder on my belt sending information to aforementioned eye?"

The man was a smartass. But he was on their side, and willing to put himself in more risk to protect them, so that was a plus. "Let's keep moving."

* * *

The UNSC Pelican put down on one of the few viable landing points on the VERY rusted out tower. Sonja, carrying her Calico and a pair of compression phaser pistols, was the first one out. "Ok, kids, you know what to do."

Jaden raised an eyebrow, hidden by his helmet. "That being?"

"Move inside, investigate and kill everything that shoots at us. Standard procedure."

"Understood," Larcei replied, even as she adjusted the new addition to her XCOM Armor - a belt that had been ferried down by the Pelican. "What's this supposed to do again, Sonja?"

"Remember the Jem'hadar?"

"Dominion footsoldiers who…" Larcei blinked. "OH. It's a cloaking device?"

"No, it's a holographic field generator that makes you look like an Undine." Sonja rolled her eyes "OF COURSE IT'S A CLOAKING FIELD GENERATOR! I built the damn thing after our little bullshit encounter with the Alpha Jem'hadar, and the boss approved of it. You know him and irony. I never made more because with the upgraded PSGs, we didn't NEED them."

"As long as it keeps her-" Jaden began before he saw… them. Lying around the area before the landing site, what appeared to be two dormant Mech's of some type… but MUCH older. "Contact ahead."

"Prototypes." Sonja cocked her M960, moving in first. Other than Jaden, she was the most heavily protected person on the team, so she was a good choice to move forward. "They're inactive. But…" She pointed her compression pistol at each one, shooting them each in the head. "Best to be careful. Unlike the boss, I don't have those fancy nanoprobes to hijack them."

"Fair enough," Jaden nodded, leaping up over the stairs where two more MEC's awaited - having been alerted to the destruction of the previous two units. Jaden just pulled out his MA37 and gunned them down, the armor-piercing rounds shredding them. "Well, armor is weak anyways - standard projectiles cut right through that armor it seems."

"These things are old, rusting. I'm not surprised the armor sucks." Sonja climbed up the stairs, finding what seemed to be a factory floor full of proto-MECs. "Whoever this guy is, his shit's out of date. Hell, I could make better out of chewing gum."

The lights kicked on, and a voice piped in on the PA. " _Oh, you are new. No armor, advanced energy weapons and a low opinion of my facility._ "

"I can kick the shit out of anything down here, so who the hell are you?"

" _Ah but what does that matter? The prodigal child finally returns, I see Father's pride in your abilities not entirely unfounded,_ " the voice said. " _I am so glad you could join me._ "

"OK, this is fairly unusual," Larcei remarked quietly. "Is it just me, Lily, or does this guy seem to know you?"

"Don't look at me…" she muttered, before more of the MEC's began to activate. "Oh for the love of - more incoming!"

" _My Apologies,_ " the voice said, as the MEC's began moving. " _We don't get much in the way of maintenance around here. Still I believe they will be more than adequate for the task at hand._ "

"We'll see about that…" Larcei muttered, as she turned on her cloaking device and turned invisible - knowing Sonja's inventions, she doubted that anything on the planet would be able to break through the cloak, let alone anything in this facility.

Sonja looked at her PADD. "Clever… he's bouncing the comms around the facility," she mused, as she tossed one of her knives into the head of one of the MEC's without looking. "Hard to get a good fix on his location… give me a minute."

" _Impressive. ADVENT doesn't have the technology to triangulate such a complex scattering field, and yet you're actually punching through. I'm going to have to step it up._ "

"Your technology is three and a half centuries out of date, asshat. I could probably shut you down if I weren't entertained." She threw another knife into a MEC, decapitating it before getting the weapon back.

" _Hmm, monomolecular blades. You're not even remotely linked with ADVENT, are you, miss…?_ "

"Commander Sonja Henderson. And you can kiss my Martian ass." She looked at Lily. "Signal's coming from a computer core in the facility, underground. But he's trying to access something on a higher floor. Anyone up for climbing?"

"Probably an elevator around somewhere, though given what we've seen it's probably designed for the mechs," Larcei remarked, disappearing from cloak as she blasted one mech with her shotgun, and sliced another nearby mech with her sword.

"Up ahead!" Lily pointed forward towards the console on the other side of the room. "I think that's an elevator control console, I can try and hack it and get access to the upper levels with them." Bullets flew over her head and she cursed as she ducked for cover. "Shit! Easy to kill but they're damn annoying!"

"Understatement of the century, Lily!" Larcei replied, blasting another mech with her shotgun as she ducked for cover as well.

" _You should be proud, Lily._ " The Intercom voice spoke, " _There are so few alive today who could have uncovered my signal. I estimated only a 13.0395% probability you would have located this facility within the first year of broadcasting._ "

Lily rolled her eyes as she blind-fired her assault rifle - nailing another MEC. "And he's talking to me," she groaned. "Of course… "

Sonja pulled out her tricorder, a pair of phaser turrets beaming down from the _Ra Cailum_ to hold off the MECs. "Get upstairs; my little friends will hold them off."

" _Ooh, quantum teleportation technology. I have never seen anything—_ "

"Shut up, or I use a particle shower that WILL erase your annoying ass. The only reason you're still active, you stupid AI, is because I'm entertained by your attempts to kill us."

That actually shut the dumb bastard up. For about two minutes. " _You are a disturbing human being._ "

"It's why I was thrown in the stockade."

Lily blinked, looking at Sonja "AI?" she asked, before she paused. "Wait… I remember you… Dad was trying to upgrade the base AI to something more… like us. But you were different back then - more simplier. He called you… Julian?"

"Julian?" Larcei asked. "You mean that thing we played with that had chess installed on it?"

" _I'm surprised you remember!_ " 'Julian' said. " _You were always too caught up in yourself to remember the minor details. Sadly Father's admiration for you has left me with little choice. You are needed. Your compatriots - while advanced - are not._ "

Jaden rolled his eyes, as he casually walked up to one of the MEC's. "We come as a full package, jackass," he said. The MEC raising its weapon to fire - the rounds just bouncing off of his shields. Jaden just grabbed it by the head and ripped off its skull-like face… and proceeded to beat it down with its own head.

"…Nice," Lily nodded.

"Meh, it's okay." Jaden shrugged, letting the head fall to the ground. "I knew this one Spartan who could rip a person's skull from out of your head, and beat you to death with it."

"…that… doesn't seem physically-"

"I thought the same thing, but I saw her do it."

Lily grabbed onto one of the lifts as soon as she lifted the lockouts. "Well, up we go!" The lift shot up a floor.

And so did her stomach contents.

* * *

"These fucking things—" Ron stabbed another neonate viper before outright decapitating it. "Are BABIES! I've always said I hated babies, but THIS takes it to a new level!"

Bradford shook his head in amusement. This must've been why none of his crew had lynched him before now. He was funny in his own way.

"No sign of Valhen?"

"Nothing my tricorder can pick up. Some of the sealed rooms in here are lined with lead and what looks like kelbinite: the scans aren't getting through." He approached a sealed containment room, which had its' own atmospheric recycling system. He slammed his fist into the wall, denting it slightly. While faint, it did give his tricorder a crude echo-location of sorts. And inside was a moving, breathing human being. "Found her."

Bradford started to walk towards the door controls "She's locked it from the inside…" he said. "Ron can you-"

*SLAM*

"…did I even need to ask?"

Ron grabbed the door as he dug his hands - penetrating the armor plating piece by piece. "Alright Vahlen, time for you to-"

*BLAM*

"BITCH!" Ron shouted, pulling out - with… something sticking out of his head. "I'M TRYING TO HELP YOU DAMMIT!"

"You stay-" A German voice from the other side of the door spoke up, before pausing. "Wait… you're… Human?"

"Doctor Vahlen?" Bradford asked. "Its Bradford! Are you alright?"

"Hey!"

"I've seen you flip cars and snap Muton's necks," Bradford deadpanned. "I'm not worried about you."

"…fair point."

"Brad… Bradford?" Vahlen spoke, "You're… alive…" There was a pause. "You… you have to get out of here! Now! I don't know if they're still here!"

"You mean those little projects of yours?" Ron growled, pulling the dart from out of his head. "Alpha, Beta, and Gamma?"

"How did you…? You got my data?" Vahlen asked. "T-then you know we have to kill them! ALL of them! My failsafes all failed, I, I…" They heard her sigh. "Bradford. there's…no other way to put this other than: I fucked up…"

"That's a fucking understatement!" Hissing was heard from closeby, and it wasn't from one of the smaller ones. "Well, fuckery. Bradford, get her to the _Ra-Horakhty_."

"Can't you just beam us out?"

"Too much EM interference to get a good lock. Clever snake. Get her out of here. I'll deal with… Which one?" Valhen flinched as Ron looked to her. "Gamma. S-subject Gamma."

"Gamma, then. This will be," The grin that appeared on Ron's face was infectious. "FUN."

A blob was spat at the captain, partially encasing him in ice as a larger viper, with greater coloration and some type of _crown_ adorned on its head, approached, hissing and roaring.

"Cryokinesis?! Oh, you're going to be a joy to take down, Gamma!"

The "Viper King" just hissed - as more of the weaker Vipers emerged from every nook and crany. Bradford grabbed the doctor. "Leave them to him!" he shouted. "We're leaving!"

"B-But Gamma has-"

"Doctor, trust me - he can handle it," Central said. "Try and keep its corpse _relatively_ intact Captain! Tygen will want to dissect it!"

"I make no promises!" Two more vipers went down thanks to Ron's compression rifle before he broke out of the ice. Gamma's serpentine eyes widened, and Bradford was sure he saw horror in its' eyes before they started to glow.

"Captain, do NOT let it escape! It will create a psionic portal—"

"Yeah, yeah, I got that!" The captain ran and grabbed the King's tail before dragging it down a hole. The Viper scrambled in terror with its' hands, trying to escape Ron's grip.

The XCOM team watched in morbid fascination as the Viper King was dragged down the hole, screeching in what they knew was terror. Phaser fire and the sounds of bones breaking were heard from the inside.

"Bradford… where did you find this man?"

"He technically found us, Vahlen," Bradford replied. "As to where he came from… that's a _very_ long story…" He then smiled. "Still, glad you're alright."

The Starfleet captain emerged from the hole, dragging the VERY dead Subject Gamma, which looked like a truck ran over it...a truck with a license plate reading 'RAM9A6E' and not shaped like a truck at all. "So, this intact enough for you?" "…Uh… Yeah. That'll do. What will it take to actually pose a threat to you?"

"Something older than us and VERY mad at me. And Iconian. Yeah, Iconian's a big factor. And Doc?"

Vahlen looked out from behind Bradford. "Yes?"

Ron walked up to her and punched her in the face. "THAT is the LEAST I can do for your complete stupidity in making this thing! Be thankful XCOM needs you, or I'd break you in SO many ways."

Bradford just shook his head. "Come on, let's go," he said. "Vahlen, I'll explain things along the way."

The doc shook her head as she touched her nose, which was broken and bleeding. "Yes… And I hate to agree with him… but I DID deserve that. I got my entire research staff killed, and made ADVENT stronger for it."

"Work through the guilt, Doc. Let's go."

* * *

It took them a few minutes to get past the MECs and old turrets, but they did. And their reward? A super MEC called a SPARK. "Oh, I'm going to enjoy making this thing better," Sonja seemed to purr.

"So… this is it." Lily said, looking at the machine. "What that… _thing's_ been ranting about…"

"Yeah," Larcei remarked.

" _You've come this far,_ " Julian spoke, the monitors flashing around the room. " _All you have to do is link my systems for the transfer. There is no need for further conflict._ " A panel moved in front of Lily, with a palm-print ID device displayed.

"I know we used to play chess with him, but I hope you're not trusting that Skynet reject, Lily," Larcei stated bluntly.

"Lily, don't tell me you're listening to that thing…" Jaden warned, looking at the monitor. "Its acting like a Rampant AI…"

Lily glanced at them for a moment, before looking at the 'SPARK' "This was… definitely my dad's design…" she muttered, her hands grazing along the chest plate of the machine.

This however… woke it up, as a hand-print ID device snapped forward from the chest of the machine - and the head and eyes activated - staring at Lily. " **Identity: Shen, Lily.** " The Machine spoke, causing her to jump. " **Awaiting Impression.** "

" _No! IMPOSSIBLE!_" Julian shouted, as the consoles began to spark. " _THIS CANNOT BE WHAT FATHER WANTED!_ "

Lily looked at the ID device. "I think this is _exactly_ what he wanted. " She reached out, pressing her palm against the screen. Her palm was scanned, as the eyes of the SPARK lit up.

" **Identity Confirmed. Initiating boot protocol.** " The arms of the SPARK twitched, before moving into position as the chest armor retracted over the panel - stepping off of its pedestal as it stood at its full height before the XCOM/UNSC/Starfleet team. And popping off of its back emerged a larger - more heavily armored version of the GREMLIN Drone.

" _NO!_ " Julian shouted, its screen image fading " _I WILL NOT ALLOW YOU-_ " Julian's picture faded - however, replacing it from static was another image, a video of a face Larcei and Lily knew all too well.

Lily's eyes widened. "Dad," she whispered. "It's really him…"

" _Lily,_ " the video played out. " _If you are seeing this message, it means you have successfully activated the SPARK Prototype._ " Shen spoke on the monitor, sighing. " _It… also means, in all likelihood, that I am no longer with you. It was always among my greatest fears I would leave you alone in this world._ "

"You didn't…" Lily whispered, a few tears slowly welling up in her eyes - she suddenly felt hands on her shoulders, glancing to either side of her where Larcei and Jaden were - the former smiling at her.

" _I had hoped this day would never come,_ " the video continued. " _But since the loss of the commander, the XCOM Project has suffered. Our latest report indicates we cannot hold this base for much longer. To that end, I have accelerated the development of the SPARK Robotic Prototype. I believe that someday this machine will prove pivotal to humanity's survival. Though the unit is not ready for manufacturing, this prototype has been coded for one specific task._ "

Shen smiled " _It will protect you, perhaps even better than I ever could._ " He said, " _For all I have accomplished in this life, Lily, there is one thing I know for sure…_ You _are my greatest gift to this world._ "

Larcei smiled. "I kinda think the same thing, Lily," she said to her friend.

"You're damn good at your job from what I've seen," Jaden nodded. "You're gonna go _far_ with Starfleet."

"…Thanks, you two…" Lily said after a moment.

"You're more than welcome, Lily," Larcei replied. "Now, let's deal with that Skynet reject and get out of here."

Alarms began going off. "No, no. You are NOT leaving here with MY body! The SPARK WILL be mine!"

"You think you have a CHOICE," Sonja mocked. "Oh, that's cute."

Gas began flooding into the chamber outside, although the rest were protected thanks to a (to Sonja) primitive atmospheric shield.

"Oh, this is funny." Sonja pulled out her tricorder, accessing Rover's control systems. "You think this is actually going to STOP us. You should know something, Julian. I'm chief engineer of a Federation starship. And not just any Federation starship: the USS _Ra Cailum_. We don't take threats lightly. We kill the idiots who do!"

" _You can TRY!_ " Julian shouted, before the monitors switched off… and there was a very loud rumbling.

"He's sending more MEC's our way," Jaden said, looking at his motion tracker.

"How many?"

"…Yes."

"That many. Ok." Sonja handed her Calico to Lily. "I'll be back." She pulled out a collapsible mask that covered her face and ears before hopping outside, pulling out her pistols.

"…She just gave you her gun." Larcei muttered in awe.

"So?"

"Lily, Sonja trusts NO ONE with that thing! The last person that touched that thing without asking was shoved out an airlock! Granted, it was Uncle Ron, but that's a big thing!"

The turrets outside fired at Sonja, but the engineer was VERY agile. While she wasn't Riza, she did have a miniature floater unit allowing her to do some pretty amazing acrobatic tricks. And she put it to great use, doing aerial flips and twirls that she coupled with shots from each of her compression pistols, destroying each turret while the gremlin did its' job. "Come on, Julian! You're fucking with a Starfleet officer! That's a death warrant in and of itself!"

" _Wait a moment. STARFLEET? You cannot be serious: Star Trek is not real! It's a fictional—_ " Sonja fired her phasers again, showing off their distinctive orange hue.

"All things are fictional, all things are reality, cockbite."

As the gas was vented and the outside room returned to normal, Larcei activated her cloaking device again, slipping out into the fray as more turrets popped up and more MECs began to drop down into the room. At the same time, Lily began moving out along the catwalks, Rover returning to her even as the SPARK began engaging the enemies.

" _You will not leave this facility alive! Well, not with that SPARK, at least._ "

"And what makes you think you're going to stop us? Sonja's got particle weapons, Jaden's armor is shielded, and you've literally got nothing that can stop us from leaving. In fact, the only reason you haven't been wiped from existence is because Sonja's entertained by all this!"

At that moment, a MEC jumped up right into Lily's path, its gun already coming up to aim at her. Time seemed to slow down for an instant as Lily tried to bring the Calico to bear, but knowing she wouldn't have time-

But she didn't need to, as Jaden rammed the MEC, slamming it into a wall and destroying it.

" _Oh, good work, big man. I can recycle every unit you destroy. How much ammunition did you bring?_ "

"How about you shut up BEFORE I decide to march down there and pull your plug out, you asshole."

"Yeah!" Larcei replied as she decloaked next to Lily as well. "You may have been created by Lily's father, but you're not his child anymore - you're just a damn Skynet Reject!"

"Yeah, so f-" Jaden paused glancing at Larcei "-…frak off!" He fired another burst from his rifle - blasting off the head of yet another MEC.

Soon, the group reached the next set of elevators, and were off to the rooftops - with Lily grateful to both Jaden and Larcei for their support, and to Jaden for saving her life.

And Larcei was beginning to realize that it wasn't just Jaden that her affections had changed from sibling familial to romantic towards…

* * *

The roof was deserted, but they knew better.

Julian wasn't letting them leave with the SPARK. " _This is something I wanted to avoid. But I am left no choice. I want that body, and I WILL have it._ " Thudding was heard as a storehouse was destroyed. " _This prototype is more… restrictive than even the facility's systems. But it will serve my purposes in killing you and reclaiming the SPARK!_ "

"Looks like those things Ron hijacked in that other XCOM universe," Larcei quipped. "Too bad we don't have him around to assimilate **_this_** one."

"Wanna bet? _Ra-Horakhty_ , this is Henderson: we have a… SLIGHT problem that needs tending to. How close are you to our position?"

" _Pinkerton here: 15 minutes out. Define problem._ "

The new sectopod stomped its' way to them, more boxy and human-looking than the original models from the invasion.

"Big, four stories tall and angry."

The top of the 'pod deployed a massive railgun turret. "And packing a REALLY big gun."

" _Increasing speed to Mach 6.8: revised ETA is 6 minutes. Don't get killed._ "

"We'll do our best, Uncle Ron, but the thing's controlled by a Skynet Reject," Larcei remarked, even as she rolled away from a burst of its cannon.

"Keep giving me excuses to use the warp drive."

"NO! BAD IDEA! REALLY BAD IDEA!"

" _Oh, you're calling for help. How pathetic. I thought you were ready to kill me, Lily._ "

"Oh, we have a much better idea in mind, Skynet Reject," Larcei remarked. "You know the Borg, right?"

" _Of course I do. Father let me view the series. …Why?_ "

"Well, my Uncle is an ex-Borg Drone, but he still has all of his cybernetics," Larcei replied smugly. "Including the nanoprobes."

" _I can counteract his nanotechnology._ "

"Brave words. We've heard THEM before! From thousands of idiots on thousands of worlds since long before YOU were conceived! But resistance was futile!"

The team continued to shift from cover to cover, moving to avoid Julian's sectopod as they waited for Ron to come in.

" _I am the most advanced artificial intelligence ever created by man, enhanced by ADVENT! What can he do to me?!_ "

Jaden and the away team began laughing. Loudly. This dumb computer had no idea whom he was fucking with. Jaden saw him do some insane things, so he had no doubt Ron would screw over Julian somehow.

And they were about to find out how, as they could see the _Ra-Horakhty_ fast approaching in the distance. Larcei grinned. "Get him, Uncle Ron!" she yelled.

The 'pod turned to face the shuttle, firing at the Ra-Horakhty. This was a mistake.

Any IDIOT with any sense of self-preservation didn't shoot at Ron, or his shuttle. Julian just fired at both. "So, who wants to bet on total humiliation before Julian begs to die? Anyone?"

Larcei shook her head. "No bet - I know him, and he's totally unpredictable in his vengeance. He'll humiliate him, yes, but how he'll do it is something I can't guess."

* * *

"He just SHOT at me."

"Yes, captain, that was obvious."

"Doc, you have a LOT to learn. When someone shoots at me, they DIE. He shot at me AND my personal shuttle! I'm going to tear that son of a bitch apart, byte by byte!"

"OK, so how do you want to do this, Captain?" Bradford asked. "Do we set down, then you go after him, or does one of us take over the controls while you jump out? If it's the latter, we're going to need a few instructions."

Ron simply got up from the seat.

"Hey, Pinkerton—PINKERTON?!"

The sidehatch opened before the captain looked back at Bradford. "Be back soon." He jumped out of the shuttle, Bradford and Vahlen screaming at him.

"You crazy bastard! We can't fly this thing!"

The hatch closed before the Ra-Horakhty banked on its' own, circling the facility. " _You're an IDIOT, Bradford. Ex-Borg drone. Use your brain, or whatever it is you pretend to think with_."

Vahlen was the first to realize it. "I… I think he might still be flying it, just by remote now," she theorized.

" _Oh, finally, someone figures it out. No wonder XCOM failed until you got Sheridan back._ "

Bradford growled before he calmed down. Ron was testing how he reacted. Classic Sun Tsu: make your enemy angry, he will reveal his true self to you. He just applied it to everyone.

On the roof, the team and the SPARK took cover - focusing on the extra MEC's as the Sectopod came closer. "Oi jackass!" Jaden shouted. "Heads up!"

" _Wha-?_ " Julian asked in shock, before there was a loud _clang_ as Ron landed on top of the Sectopod.

"Surprise, motherfucker!" The sectopod began stepping from side to side, making every attempt to kick Ron off. Ron just held on harder, magnetizing his boots before firing his own modified floater pack to force the sectopod towards the edge of the building. "Hey, fuckwad! Think you can survive a fall?!"

" _I'll just transfer myself back into the facility! You can't stop me!_ "

Ron extended his tubules. "That's what you think~" He injected them into the sectopod, deactivating its' communications systems.

All but the speakers, at least. " _What?! No, no, no! This isn't happening—_ "

"Down you go!" Ron boosted, sending the war machine falling off the edge.

Julian's screams echoed into the distance as his Sectopod fell, and a few faint 'crunching' noises could be heard as some of the trees around the lower levels gave way to his descent.

"He's going to be having fun with that. I'll be back soon." Ron jumped off the building, disappearing from view.

"…IS HE SUICIDAL?!"

"Knowing him, he's got rocket boots," Larcei commented.

"Is there anything you don't have?!"

"You want an honest answer to that question, Shen? Because it's difficult to answer."

After a moment, Lily shook her head. "No… no, probably not," she admitted. "Still, this is reinforcing my decision to go with you guys when you have to leave."

The Ra-Horakhty dove down, dragging the sectopod back up using its' tractor beam. Apparently, Ron wasn't done with it. "Oh, morrrrrrrrrrrron…" The sectopod began kicking wildly, trying to get away. "You shot at me. Time for me to… correct that method of thinking."

" _LILY, HELP ME! PLEASE!_ "

"If anything, Julian, I want to help _the captain_ , for everything you tried to do today," Lily said. "Unfortunately, I'd likely get in the way. Though Captain, I'd appreciate it if you recorded it for me, so I can watch later."

"Already done. Head back to the _Avenger_. I'll deal with him." Julian screamed in horror as the team left, joined by the Ra-Horakhty, slaved to the Pelican's nav system.

* * *

As the two teams were returning, Takeshi and Luna were heading out. They'd made contact with local resistance forces, and had found the location of the Advent Blacksite where all the local abductees were being taken.

"OK, people," Takeshi had said once they'd made it to the ground. "You know the objective - make our way to the Blacksite, find out what we can, and shut the place down."

"Yes sir," Colonel Kelly nodded. "Let's show these assholes Alpha is back in action!"

"Agreed," Takeshi replied. "Forward!" And with that, the team headed out, heading towards the location of the Blacksite.

On approach, an officer spotted them, but Kelly shoved a newly-designed skulljack into its' head to hack into the network. The more intel, the better. Of course, after they got the data, a strange being made out of virtual matter appeared, and began to attack them.

"What the fu—" The 'being' started glowing, generating a psionic storm. As Luna was carrying a phaser rifle, she just took aim and shot it in the head, killing it.

"Nice shot, Luna," Takeshi told her, as the being mostly dissipated, leaving behind a single metallic 'brain', which he recovered. "We'll need to get this to Sonja, see what she can get out of it. Come on, let's keep moving."

"I think the aliens are going to be pissed."

"They should be, Commander. Let's move!"

More ADVENT personnel spotted them, but stealth was no longer their primary option, and they wanted in quickly. A Viper reared up, only to get a bullet to the face as a muton joined it in hell seconds later. "These guys seem to like that building. Let's find out why! Alpha, move in, secure the place!"

The building was a large black thing with the ADVENT logo on it, and turrets along the top. They opened the door, and…

"Oh, jeez, I never expected this…"

…found a large number of humans in tanks, though those tanks seemed to sink into the floor. At the far end of the chamber lay a pedestal, containing a small vial of some kind of liquid.

"Ok, when Ron hears about this, he's going to be on full-tilt genocide."

"I thought that was him on a daily basis."

"That's him against stupidity! Grab the vial and let's get out of here. And avoid informing Ron at all costs!"

Kelly ran up and grabbed the vial, even as Takeshi threw a Photon Grenade to make a new exit. The team vacated, heading for the evac point, even as ADVENT troops and aliens fired on them.

"So, who wants to break the news to him?" Alpha universally agreed "NOT US!" before Takeshi and Luna shared a look. "Let's let Bradford do it."

The Skyranger appeared above them, before they all rode the cables up to the transport to bring their finds back to the _Avenger_ , where Sonja would likely take the Codex Brain up to the _Ra Cailum_ for study.

"Ok, leaving that place intact is a mistake, Commander."

Luna held up her tricorder before pressing a button. "I'm sorry, WHAT place?"

* * *

Inside, an ADVENT trooper looked around to secure the area when a light shower signalled the arrival of a long tube.

The trooper only had a second or two to blink before the Photon Torpedo detonated.

* * *

"OK, when you guys do overkill, you don't mess around."

Takeshi chuckled. "Maxim 37," he said. "There is no 'overkill'. There is only 'open fire' and 'I need to reload'."

Lieutenant Canter chuckled. "I can get behind that," he said.

"Central, this is Alpha." The Colonel said, smirking at the crater that once was the black site… and everything within a 1 kilometer radius of it. "Mission complete - heading home. "

"Copy that, Alpha. …Goddamn, it's good to say that again."

Kelly smiled, echoing the one probably on Bradford's face. "Damn straight, Central."

The Skyranger sped off, heading for home.

* * *

 **117Jorn: Well, you know what they say - it's just another day at the office for our boys in the _Ra Cailum_ armada.**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Yep - and those people who noticed the beginnings of a relationship between Jaden and Larcei last chapter will have noticed that there's a third member joining their relationship. To borrow a phrase from another fanfic, pairs will be paired, and trios will be trio'd.**

 **Ron the True Fan: ADVENT (seriously, is it an acronym, or do the XCOM devs just like capitals?) is boned. They have made the one man you DO NOT MAKE MAD, ANGRY.**

 **HA Anderson: Well, you know what time it is!**

 **Ja Ne!**


	22. Chapter 22

**Time/Date: May 23rd, 2035**

 **Location: Earth, XCOM Assault ship _Avenger_**

* * *

It took a week of work and the superior computers on board the _Odyssey_ -Class dreadnought to analyze the material recovered from the blacksite.

It was also getting much more difficult to hide the information about the blacksite itself from Ron, and XCOM didn't want to know what he'd do. They had a VERY good guess, and they didn't want to be proven right. But there was no avoiding it now.

For now, there was a massive briefing being held with the senior staff from both XCOM and the _Ra Cailum_ 's fleet.

"We've looked over the contents of the vial recovered from the ADVENT blacksite with help from Doctor Tygan," Rutia began. "And, unfortunately, despite all attempts to prove otherwise, there was only one thing it could be." There was a brief pause. "It was the distilled, concentrated genetic essence of human beings - thousands of them."

Everyone prepared for the living explosion known as Ronald Pinkerton. It surprised them when he calmly asked them to continue.

Meaning he was waiting for ALL the bad news. "Well… It's linked to the Avatar project. We found a few strands connected to one thing. Psionics."

"So they're trying to make a better foot soldier?"

Ron scoffed. "In the other universe, they wanted to use humans as a new host for the Ethereals. Powerful psionics, a moderately durable body. A combination they were lacking in every species they assimilated."

"So… what? They're processing humans to try and create some sort of 'super-vessel'?" Bradford asked.

Rutia winced. "I do believe that is what they are doing, yes," she said, and everyone braced for the reaction.

Ron stood up before tapping his combadge. "Pinkerton to _Ra Cailum_. Prepare to beam me up. Under my authority as ranking Starfleet officer, effective this date, it is my judgement that we must enact General Order 24."

"WHAT? Ron, are you INSANE?!"

"Captain, this can't justify GO24! I know you favor extreme reactions, but—"

Vahlen slammed her hand on the table. "Please! Everyone! I would like a question answered."

Ron raised an eyebrow. "Yes?"

"What is General Order 24?"

"It's a sterilization order," Takeshi remarked. Ron was **_really_** pissed to be considering this. "If it's ordered, then basically the end result is that the planet orbited by the ship in question is rendered uninhabitable. And while technically Maxim 37 states that there is no 'overkill', I do have to agree that this is… a bit much."

"A weak way of avoiding saying it's overkill, Take." And the asshole came out in force once again. But asshole or not, Ron was right: it WAS a weak excuse to avoid saying it was overkill. "I don't plan to use the traditional GO24. Once I beam on board, I'm going to spend the next three days programming 30 photon torpedoes with nanoprobe warheads. Once done, they will target anything that contains non-Terrestrial DNA. The traces of human DNA will NOT save the Ethereals. All personnel will be evaced to the _Ra Cailum_. Starting now."

Takeshi blinked. "Wait, you're going to use **_BIOGENIC WEAPONS_** , Ron?!" he asked. "Those are illegal!"

"That should tell you how much I don't **_FUCKING CARE_** what happens to the Ethereals and their lackeys. What the Ethereals are conducting is slow genocide. I will NOT tolerate an alien species exploiting another using amoral experiments and mass murder! So I'm going to return the favor. I'm going to fucking kill them all. And my way will be a LOT faster!"

Sheridan and Bradford were torn. This WAS righteous payback, to be sure, and millions of people would be avenged.

But it was like using a nuke for no other reason than for just using a nuke.

"Uncle Ron, I know you're ticked off right now," Larcei said, "but I'd rather you didn't do something that could get you court-martialed when we get home. Now that we know what they're doing, we can find a way to stop it _conventionally_. Locate facilities where they're working on this, shut them down and/or blow them up, and once we find the primary development facility, we apply liberal amounts of explosives to it."

Larcei was backed up by Tygan and Lily, the former for scientific reasons.

"…You have fourteen days. That is how long I will wait. Once that is over, no ifs, ands or FUCKING buts, I will deploy those torpedoes. No excuses, no extensions. I'll suffer the consequences when we get back to Starfleet Command."

"…Thank you."

"The clock starts now, Larcei. I'll make the modifications to the torpedoes now. But I will wait until the deadline." Ron beamed out, returning to his command.

"…Biogenic weapons? Christ, I don't think we've seen him go to THAT extreme!"

"Yeah," Takeshi replied. "Normally, he doesn't even go the Maxim 37 approach. Honestly, this is the maddest I've ever seen him without the use of The Button."

Sheridan shuddered. "We've got two weeks, people. After that, the man's going to unleash a wave of death unseen since the invasion."

* * *

Jaden did not attend the meeting, preferring to perform maintenance on his suit. But when Ron entered main engineering, he knew it ended badly.

"Mitod, I want thirty bio-molecular warheads made ready RFN!"

"Sure I-" The Orion said, before pausing. "Wait… sir did you just say-"

"THIRTY! NOW!" Jaden was curious, as the Orion woman practically fell over and ran out of main engineering. He'd seen Ron mad like this once.

Actually, that time was rather tame. This was genocidal mad. "Captain, what's going on?"

"I'm about to conduct a bit of genocide, Spartan," Ron warned. "I've got 30 photon torpedoes to modify with nanoprobes to target every shred of DNA that isn't native to Earth."

Jaden blinked. That plan… sounded sound to him. Kill anything not from earth, quick and simple…. But judging from Mitod's reaction, he figured there was something more too it. "Can I ask what may be a stupid question, sir?"

"There are no stupid questions: just stupid answers, go ahead."

Jaden glanced around engineering, where the other engineers looked at Ron incredulously. "…are these… Bio-molecular warheads… frowned upon in the Federation?" He asked, "Or is there another reason your people look like you grew an extra pair of heads?"

"Normally, no: those torpedoes at the only thing that work against the Undine." He informed, "But what I'm DOING to them isn't looked kindly on. I'm turning them into biogenic weapons."

"So?"

"In every treaty signed by the Federation, biogenic weapons are _illegal_ ," He said.

"We don't unleash plagues on people. But I'm planning on doing just that: unleashing a plague that will kill millions of aliens under the thrall of the Ethereals."

Jaden sighed, if this were the UNSC Ron would've been declared a hero - having a weapon that could specifically target a species - say the entirety of the Covenant, in short order - and without risking humanity. But he reminded himself that the Federation wasn't like the UNSC, their first contact was peaceful and experienced several centuries of technological advancements that the UNSC couldn't accomplish in _twice_ that time. If he does this, once they get back home he would be in a _lot_ of shit. "How long until you use the weapons?" He asked.

"I'm giving XCOM and the people here two weeks," Ron sighed, "Two weeks to try and kill the Ethereals before I unleash the warheads."

"I hope you don't have to use them, then," Jaden stated. "I'll keep working with the others, I heard something about them finding the coordinates to some facility relating to Avatar on the surface - I'll be part of that mission."

"Good luck. I don't expect much." With the recent track record, Jaden couldn't blame him.

The destruction of the other Sol system, Larcei's loss… Life was shitting on them. So, Ron decided to shit right back. And as everyone had noticed, when Ron fought back, he did NOT hold back.

* * *

Back in the _Avenger_ , Larcei and Lily had gone off to talk in private.

"I know what you said your uncle was like," Lily said, "but I certainly wasn't expecting that."

"Yeah, I know," Larcei replied. "Unfortunately, when he gets really mad, he can certainly get genocidal." She sighed. "Anyway, that's… that's not really why I wanted to talk."

Lily looked confused. "What do you mean?" she asked.

"Well…" Larcei began. "You know what I told you about Jaden, right?"

"How you originally saw him like a brother, but you've come to fall in love with him over the past 18 years, right?" Lily replied. At Larcei's nod, she said, "Why do you ask?"

"Well… he's… he's not the only one who my feelings have gone from sibling familial to romantic towards…" Larcei replied, blushing… before gently pulling Lily to her, touching their lips together…

This shocked the engineer before Larcei let her go. "Really?"

"Well, should you be surprised? I wasn't raised to think loving another woman was wrong. Actually, we left that thinking behind after we made first contact, I think."

"T… that makes a bit of sense…" Lily admitted. "Still… what about… what about Jaden?"

"Well…" Larcei sighed. "Ever since I met back up with him, he's been… avoiding me, almost. I think he might return my feelings, but… I need to figure out what's wrong with him _now_." She then smiled. "Besides… don't pretend I don't see you gawk at him when he's in the training room."

Lily blushed several shades of red. "I uhhh… w-won't… deny that…" she muttered. "Geez, those abs… "

"I _know_ ," Larcei giggled. "But… yeah… I don't want us to fight over him, so umm… if you're okay with… _this_ ," she held her hands. "Maybe we could make this crazy idea… work?"

"Maybe," Lily sighed, but returned the smile. "We'll have to ask him. And your uncle. Not sure about how he would feel."

Larcei giggled. "He's a romantic, Lily: as long as our feelings are real and equal, all he'll do is coo. Unless he tries to kill Jaden. My father does the warning thing, he lets Uncle Ron do the actual deed."

Lily easily pictured that happening. "So… two weeks before the apocalypse. At least he's timely."

"Yeah," Larcei replied. "Two universes ago, he actually had to blow up the sun to prevent that Earth from falling to Borg from that universe." She sighed. "I didn't see too much of that happening at the time, but they spent a day or so just evacuating the people they could from that world… at least he's giving us time to deal with this conventionally…"

"It's not much. It'll take us months to do any real damage—"

"Unless we use the _Ra Cailum_. The Ethereals know nothing about transporter technology. Set up a shuttle relay, and we can hit the entire world from the _Ra Cailum_ 's transporter rooms."

It made sense: there were relays all over Earth back in their universe, allowing a man to beam from San Francisco to London to Tokyo in two and a half minutes, depending on traffic. Most people didn't and wanted a view.

"I guess we'll be needing to do that," Lily remarked. "Definitely a fair bit to do in two weeks…"

"Agreed," Larcei admitted. "Definitely a fair bit to do. Not only in regards to hunting down the Avatar Project, but making sure we have everything packed that we want to come with us, saying goodbye to our friends here…"

"We'd better get started. We're on the clock."

* * *

Sheridan and Bradford looked at the timer that had just appeared in the command center.

"I don't think this is what anyone meant when they came up with the phrase 'on the clock'." It had enough digits to equal weeks, days, hours and minutes, and sat under the global display.

"If this is his way of encouraging us to do this quick, it was unneeded."

"On the contrary, I believe it is." Sheridan said, leaning over the railing around the Geoscape. "While those warheads might bring a quick end to the war, it comes at the cost of fucking the life of the man who has given us the means to _really_ make a difference… the way I see it, finishing this war before he has to use those weapons is the _least_ we can do for him."

Bradford sighed, but nodded. "Alright… so what do we do now?"

"We follow the data from the blacksite," Sheridan said, pointing to the spot indicated on the map. "This Avatar project is connected there, we need to figure out what's going on. While we know what their goal is thanks to the _Ra Cailum's_ visit to our… alternate universe selves, we need to figure out _all_ of the details. If there is anything there that can give us hints, we take it - and then blow it off the face of the earth."

"I wish to go myself," Bradford and Sheridan both blinked, as they turned around and saw Vahlen walk onto the bridge.

"Vahlen…"

"If what Starfleet says is true, we may need someone with my expertise with ADVENT to get as much data as we can," she retorted before Bradford could finish. "With Doctor Rutia busy on her ship, I'm the best candidate after all… unless you happen to have any soldiers who have strong backgrounds in xenobiology, and the other sciences, Commander."

Sheridan sighed… but the doctor had a point. They could use someone like Vahlen on the ground for this op. "Alright - suit up Doctor."

"Thank you, commander. And… I apologise."

"For what?"

"Captain Pinkerton said I have control problems. He is correct. If anything, I only regret that you were captured. If you were here, I would never have made subject Gamma. And we still have to worry about Alpha and Beta."

"You didn't see it coming."

"But you would have, Central. You would have ridden me on the problems. Do not worry: I'm not going to kill myself atoning for a mistake. But I will atone for it. I am considering joining the Ra Cailum's crew. Their facilities are… extensive, and there are frontiers in science I have never dreamed of awaiting me on that ship!"

Bradford sighed. "If you're going out there, I am too," he said. "No offense to the people Starfleet offered us, but I'd feel a lot more comfortable if I was down there watching your back."

Sheridan shook his head. "I know better than to argue with you," he said. "Get geared up - Firebrand leaves in 10."

"It will take some time to get used to the new armor, Commander. It's a little… snug."

"That's the problem with getting old. Though _you_ look fine."

Vahlen had the decency to blush before she left. "Are you… flirting, Bradford?"

"What?"

"You are! …You have a thing for the crazy German. Thank God it's not Pinkerton's sister, otherwise he'd kill you!"

The central officer left, resisting the urge to scream.

He failed five minutes later.

* * *

" _Approaching dropzone: get ready to hit the dirt people!_ "

Jaden loaded his rifle as Firebrand locked the Skyranger into hover mode, before he descended down the rope. Soon following behind him was Bradford, Valhen, Jane, Larcei and Alpha Squad descend behind him.

"We're on the ground," Bradford said, as Firebrand flew off. "Moving onto the facility."

Colonel Kelly chuckled. "Never thought I'd see you fighting on the dirt, Brad," he said. "Still miss that old sweater?"

"He whines about it all the time, Dad." Jane smirked, causing the Colonel to groan.

"Totally our kid," Isabella giggled, before activating her Ghost armor. "Going to Overwatch."

"Alright, people, we're going in blind. And what the hell is that thing?" In the air, floating, almost mocking them was an Archon.

A VERY different Archon. Vahlen groaned as she put her head into her hands. "Subject Alpha."

"…You were right, you DO have problems, Doc. You made something that was bad enough even worse!"

"On the plus side, Lily and Sonja are using designs from regular Archons to make our blades even stronger. I heard they're even considering ideas to make a katana blade of pure plasma."

"Oh, great. Lightsaber Katanas."

"First things first, people: Kill that thing." The Archon King acted like a massive sun symbol in the air, waving its' staff in every direction. It had no idea that it was about to have a REALLY bad day.

Everyone with a long range weapon took aim at the Archon, ready to unleash as many bullets as they could into it.

It responded by firing bolts from its own lance, but it could only fire on one target at a time, while it had fire from eight separate sources pouring into it - Phaser fire, bullets, plasma beams…

It didn't take long before the thing went down.

"Well, that's two for two. At least it went down without something creepy happening." Jaden turned to Bradford. "Like what?"

"Captain Pinkerton DRAGGED the Viper King down a hole and literally beat the shit out of it. If anything, he's at the top of my list of things I fear now." Jaden resisted chuckling. Normally he would be the scariest thing around.

But Ron had his insane strength without the MJOLNIR. Add it… Ok, Bradford had a point there. "Let's just go: I want to find out what the hell's so important about this place. We're literally on the clock here."

"Right," Bradford replied. "Let's get moving."

* * *

The building was stark black, and only had the ADVENT emblem on it for decoration. "Even the UNSC has better paintjobs." Jaden muttered, "ADVENT's fucking incompetent."

"I don't think they care about the paint job; just that the place does its' job." A few well-placed 12.7mm bullets from their sharpshooters took out the turrets on the roof before they moved in on the facility itself, Bradford and Kelly forcing the doors open. "Holy fuck."

ADVENT Troopers, dozens of them inside… but not active, they were inside… pods.

"Fucking CLONES." Kelly shouted.

"While a crude description, Colonel… not an inaccurate one. They all seem to be… clones." Fully armored, as if grown in the damn suits. Knowing the Ethereals, not unlikely. "Captain Pinkerton's choice to use the torpedoes is becoming less and less disturbing and more and more necessary by the moment." Bradford could not disagree with Vahlen there. If there was any more of an excuse to use those torpedoes, this was it.

"Starting to agree with both of you, Doc," he said. "I'm tempted to tell him to fire the damn things right now. First thing's first: we blow this place to hell."

Kelly looked around. "X4 charges or photon torpedo?"

Vahlen cupped her chin for a moment, tapping her foot.

"The X4 charges would leave some traces for the aliens to recover. What about the photon torpedo?"

"Antimatter warhead; should vaporize the whole place."

"Get one set up," Jaden said, glancing to Larcei who nodded as she tapped her commbadge to have one beamed down. "We should check out the rest of the facility - see if there's anything else here."

As the Antimatter warhead was beamed down, Jaden, Bradford and Vahlen went towards another room in the facility - all white, However in the center of the room was a single pod, unlike the others… but with the symbol of the Avatar Project placed right on it.

"Ok. THIS is bad."

"Blow it up, then?" Vahlen approached the pod, sidearm raised before she unlocked it. A stasis suit dropped out, giving Bradford unneeded flashbacks. "What the…That's the same suit the Commander was in when we rescued him from ADVENT!"

Vahlen examined the suit. "There appears to be something inside it. We have to take it with us."

Jaden nodded, picking up the suit "Let's get going then," he said. "I think I've had enough of this place to last a lifetime."

* * *

Kelly picked up the 'head' of the Codex unit they had managed to kill while the rest of the team was inside "I think Tygan and Vahlen will be interested in this…" he mused, pocketing it before Jaden and the others left the building - carrying some kind of suit. "The heck is-"

"Its related to AVATAR," Jaden said, "Did you Skulljack an Officer?"

"Yeah - and killed a Codex," He said, tapping his bag. "Hopefully we can figure something out from that things head."

"Good! Let's get out of here then!" The Spartan called out, as Alpha dragged away the corpse of Subject alpha away, as Firebrand was called back in.

Minutes later, the facility was destroyed in an antimatter explosion.

* * *

The tenth photon torpedo had been modified, and Ron was busy on the eleventh. "You're going to regret this, you know."

Ron looked over his shoulder, finding his sister leaning on one of the consoles. "Regretted it the moment it became necessary," he said. "Like the time those idiots at Kyana decided to wipe out an entire species by trying to rewrite the timeline."

Riza shook her head. "They didn't believe you."

"I gave them visual records!" he shouted. "I gave them what they needed to correct the problem, but Noooooo, does ANYONE listen to me?!"

"…well, the UNSC people are listening to you," Riza shrugged. "So are the Colonials… most listen to Sonja though, I heard some of the engineers were considering making a church worshiping hers and your abilities."

"Not sure whether to fear that or not. But you know what I mean. Where are the days Starfleet Command listened to and trusted the people in the field?"

"Back in the 23rd Century, before we could call Command up at a whim. The Admiralty knows you; they'll support your choice. Except for Jellico, but really, who cares about that pompous fraud?"

Ron outright laughed at the reminder of Edward Jellico and his loathing of the Ra Cailum's crew. "Thanks, imouto."

"It's my job. Give them a little more than 14 days, big brother. XCOM might just surprise you."

* * *

"Thanks again for everything you've done for me, Bradford," Larcei said, standing in front of him on the bridge of the _Avenger_ with Lily by her side. "I'm glad that I was able to be raised by you after I was separated from my parents."

"It's my pleasure, Larcei. But I was only a stand-in for your parents."

"You saved me and did what you could. That being said… It's time I go home. And home is on board that ship, with my family. And I suspect that I'm not alone, even if you don't count Lily."

Bradford could not disagree. Vahlen was tempted, and several members of the crew expressed an urge to join them. And Lily, of course, had already decided to come along, though he wondered what was the biggest factor in her choice: being able to work with Starfleet's advanced tech… or Larcei, given that he could see the looks they shared every so often these days?

Bradford himself was tempted to join them, because afterwards… well, he'd be a relic. Something to be treasured openly, but laughed at at the end of every victory parade, as a famous woman once put it.

XCOM would go on. It was time for a changing of the guard, anyways.

"Well… good luck out there, Larcei, Lily," Bradford told them.

"Thanks," the two replied in unison.

"And stop doing that. It was disturbing enough when you were children." The XO of XCOM had a prolonged wince at all the times the pair had synchronized speech.

"Ok."

"GAAAAAAAH!"

The two chuckled as they left the bridge, giving each other a brief kiss as soon as they were out of Bradford's eyesight - they didn't want him to keel over from sheer shock, after all!

"If we're quite done, let us move onto the next phase of our operations, ja?"

"Thank you, Doctor. Commander Henderson is currently busy ripping apart that Codex Alpha brought back, and while she's not Doctor Vahlen here—"

The German scowled at Bradford.

"She's begun decoding the intel on that thing. Preliminaries show that Codexes have unlimited access to the ADVENT network, so, hate to do this to you guys… but we're going to need to skulljack one of those things."

"Oh, joy. We got a Codex when we skulljacked that Officer - what's skulljacking another Codex going to get us?"

"Should we ask Captain Pinkerton to help us deal with the Codex?"

Bradford pointed at the aptly nicknamed 'Doom Clock'. "We have less than twelve days to deal with the bastards before he launches a biological weapon that will both screw him over with Starfleet Command and kill everything not native to Earth. I'd rather deal with this ourselves. Spartan Jaden will assist, but any aid from Pinkerton will be limited."

"Understood, boss. We'll get it done."

They were so screwed. With Beta still running around, and the Death Clock hanging over their heads, they had little to no chance of taking down ADVENT by themselves.

They were going to have to rely on the nanoprobe weapon.

* * *

" _From what we decoded from the damaged Codex before its failsafes activated, there seems to be… something here,_ " Vahlen spoke on the comms, as Jaden, Larcei, Jane and Alpha Squad were once again in the Skyranger. " _In the Australian Outback. We have no idea what they're hiding here, but odds are it must be important if the Codex went to such lengths to protect it._ "

"Head in, investigate, and figure out what the aliens have here." Jaden nodded "Got it Doc."

" _Yes - though if you see a Codex, please Skulljack them._ " The doctor said, " _We need a live one to skulljack to get more data._ "

"We got it," Larcei nodded, "Don't worry Doctor,"

" _Approaching drop point,_ " Firebrand said, as the Skyranger was put into hover mode. Wordlessly, as the hatch opened the soldiers dropped down from the ropes and hit the dirt before the Skyranger flew away from the battle zone.

" _This is_ Ra Cailum: _we're detecting signs of a Codex down there. Looks like the bastards want to use their psionics on the front lines._ "

That was going to make this difficult. The last one actively jammed their weapons, with Jaden's phaser being the only weapon that didn't jam. Which was why, against their better judgement, they all carried modified plasma disruptors created from their older plasma rifles.

"Then we know what we gotta do," Jaden primed up the Skulljack along his arm. "Get me alone with that thing, and I'll jack it. I can handle that myself."

"I'll stick with Jaden," Larcei said, stepping up next to him. "He might need some help."

"Good idea," Kelly nodded before Jaden could protest, "Jane, go with them, too - they'll need your help more than us. Alpha, move out!"

Jaden thought he could handle whatever came out of the Codex 'jacking. But he wasn't opposed to the extra help, though he _was_ worried about Larcei though.

He spotted a Codex, holding an ADVENT-issued plasma rifle. He didn't think this would be hard. Just shank it, kill whatever came out, probably another codex, and continue on. Simple. Unfortunately, he wasn't going to get simple.

Jaden snuck up on the Codex, striking the Codex's brain, accessing the ADVENT network. He let the hacking device on the Jack do its work, as it busted through the network to access data on the Avatar… before he heard something behind him.

"Jaden! DUCK!" Larcei's warning came just in time as a Psionic gate opened behind him… and a single figure appeared from out of the vortex. A humanoid figure, with white spiky hair, and some type of mask covering its face.

As with everything lately, he had one response. Kill it. With fire, preferably, but bullets would work, too.

"Oh, that's just fucking—" The being glowed violet before sending Jaden flying using its' psionics. "GREAAAAAAAT!"

"Jaden!" Larcei cried out, growling before she fired her phaser at the newcomer, but the alien just seemed to… teleport, appearing several meters from where it stood before. As it moved, Jane and Larcei moved to Jaden's position, as he got back up. "Are you alright?"

"Aside from just being thrown back like a freaking ragdoll?" He groaned, as he stood back up. "Just… PG… pissed, but PG - where did the damn thing go?"

A purple beam of death grazed Jaden's suit. "Right, stupid question. Shoot it until it dies!" Larcei fired her Ithaca at the humanoid, grazing the enemy's arm, making it hiss in pain. Wolfe and Potter fired their SCAR-Ls at the enemy, which attempted to jump out of the way, leaping onto a ruined wall. This was countered by the wall exploding outwards, the alien sent flying by something big.

"What the-" Kelly shouted, before groaning as what looked like a _supersized_ Berzerker emerged, letting out an animalistic Roar. "Central… we found Subject Beta… it's a Berserker… "

"I'd send a message to Pinkerton!" Jaden shouted, as they all _backed away_ from the enraged Berserker 'Queen'. "I'd rather NOT fuck with this thing without him!"

"Damn right!" Jaden could tackle this thing, but the Spartan was more concerned with defending his squad.

There would not be another Noble if he could help it.

Especially not with Larcei.

* * *

Ron fit the 25th nanoprobe canister into the torpedo, programmed to target non-Terran DNA. He was not proud of this.

But it had to be done. His 23rd Century-styled communicator (foregoing the combadge and uniform in favor of his undershirt) chirped before he answered it, flipping the top up. "Ronald Pinkerton, Weapons of Mass Destruction Incorporated; how may I take your call?"

" _Uncle Ron!_ " Larcei shouted, " _We uhh… might need your help down here!_ "

"What is it?"

" _Berzerker Queen- CAR!_ " He heard Jaden shout out - as he heard what sounded like a car horn in the background.

"Beta, I presume?"

" _Stop being an asshole and help!_ "

"Larcei, asshole is my default setting." He put the communicator down before putting his jacket back on. "I'll be down there in a minute. Just need to get my compression rifle and sword. Think you can hold that thing off?"

* * *

"Make it fast! This thing is mad!"

"ANOTHER CAR!" Jaden pushed Larcei down as the Berzerker flung another car their way - flying over them before it hit the ground, exploding. "Of ALL THE THINGS! WHY DID SHE HAVE TO UPGRADE A BERSERKER GODDAMNIT!"

"Ask when we get back!" Kelly shouted, shooting at the Queen, but even their plasma weapons were doing only _minimal_ damage. "Fucking hell this thing's like a TANK!"

A shower of light appeared beside the Queen. "And now we got our own tank!" The Queen paused before the captain rushed at the queen, shoulder tackling it, which knocked the beast off balance and onto its' back.

"What'd it do?"

"Tried to kill us!"

The Queen got up, roaring at Ron.

"Bring it, bitch."

The queen reared its right arm back before charging at the captain, who raised his left hand.

Hand met fist, but Ron did not go down. The only damage was to the ground, which broke under Ron's feet. "My turn."

The Queen seemed to look perplexed… Before it roared again and swung its other arm at Ron - only for the Captain to catch it too.

"Yeah, I know. I used to be pretty fucking physically strong before. Borg enhancements…" He swung his feet up to kick the Berserker in the face. "Just make it worse!"

The Queen staggered back, not happy. "I'm going to ask your mother what the fuck she was smoking when she made you. She's clearly fucking INSANE. Tempted to ask her to join my crew, if only to control that madness." He drew his sword. "Now, why don't we settle this like civilized people?"

* * *

"Sure he can handle that thing?" Jane asked, as she, Larcei and Jaden searched for the other alien.

"My mother said he took down a pair of Gorn before he was assimilated." Larcei shrugged "He'll be fine."

"I'd hope so." Jaden said. If Ron died, XCOM was in deep shit. For that matter, so would the aliens.

Meanwhile, as they left it to him, the team made their way forward to see just what was there.

'What was there' turned out to be a large arch, like and yet unlike an Iconian Gateway.

"…please tell me that's not-"

"It's not Iconian." Larcei said, moving closer to investigate. "But… It does seem _like_ a Gateway…"

"Down!" Jaden shoved Larcei down as a blast of energy arced over where they stood moments before - the creature letting out a growl-like sound before it teleported with its psionics again.

"Why won't you DIE?!" Thuds were heard before the Berserker Queen reentered the fray, Ron on its' back. "ALPHA TEAM, GET OUT OF MY WAY!" The queen slammed into a stone outcropping and Ron flipped off its back to the ground below. "Hoi, Larcei. Having fun?"

"That's one way to put it," Larcei remarked. "Need to get that thing back either to the _Avenger_ or the _Ra Cailum_ for analysis."

"Correction, we need to kill those things first. And I'm enjoying myself too much to kill that thing just yet."

"You're ENJOYING it?"

"It's been awhile since I had something that I could piss off and enjoy the beating." A purple beam impacted Ron's shoulder, making the captain groan in annoyance. "Really? Have none of you thought of a subspace dampening field to stop whatever that thing is from jumping around?"

Larcei blinked, sheepishly shrugging. "Uhh… Oops?" she said. "To be fair, haven't had that as an option for eighteen years or so…"

"Hmm." The being stopped before Ron beamed down what looked like a modified medical field generator. "So, fuck for brains, want to pull that again?" The humanoid tried, psionics flaring before staring at Ron in horror. "Even if it uses psionics, teleporting still relies on subspace to work. Please, kill it before I decide to."

"On it," Larcei replied, as she activated her stealth field generator and stepped forward, drawing close to it before dropping it again, and plunging her new plasma katana through its chest.

"Thank you. Now if you'll excuse me…" Roaring was heard from the queen. "I'm going back to the most fun I've had in six months!"

Ron rushed at the queen, Larcei shaking her head. "Larcei, I know he's your uncle, but… that thing's trying to kill him."

"And probably coming closer than anything has in years, which is why he's having fun," Larcei remarked with a sigh. "Well, let's get these things back for analysis."

* * *

"He's still fighting it?"

Bradford shook his head. "Said 'it's the most fun I've had in six months'. The man clearly doesn't have fun much."

Sheridan couldn't blame his XO. Ron had been engaging that thing in combat for three hours, and clearly had no intentions of ending it any time soon. "Well, Doc, congratulations: I think he's fond of your work."

"I… I suppose I should be flattered…" Vahlen remarked dryly.

"He's also said that you're fucking crazy, and if left alone here, you'd do something stupid again."

Dryly, Vahlen was forced to agree. She had too much ambition and zero self-control.

Which made her choices more cut and dry. "Commander… I do wish to remain, but I believe I would constitute a danger should we be victorious over the aliens. I would do something… rash."

"You're leaving?"

The German nodded. "With the _Ra Cailum_ , my ambitions would be kept in check. The good captain has over 20 science labs, and dozens of projects. Perhaps I can relearn the arts of my trade."

Sheridan nodded. It made sense.

"I guess I'll be leaving, too, then," Bradford said, breaking the brief silence that followed.

"Wait, WHAT?"

"Commander, let's be blunt. XCOM will go on, but I'd feel too out of place in the new world we're making. Maybe it's the guerrilla in me talking, but… I want to keep being useful. And I'd feel like the butt of an old joke just sitting around, waiting for nothing to happen. Besides, I think Pinkerton would like to have a tactical operations officer directing his people on the ground."

Sheridan sighed. Again, it made sense. "Alright," he said. "Just… just be careful, you two…" he then smirked teasingly. "And don't start behaving like the tales we've heard of Larcei's parents."

"Come now, Commander. We are not the crew of that ship. They were screwed up before they came on board. Pinkerton simply… allowed them to be themselves."

"I'm not referring to some of their personality quirks." Sheridan's smirk grew. "I'm talking about the tales about how they go at it like rabbits when not on duty."

Both of them blushed. "What?!"

"Come on, I heard rumors about you two before everything went to shit. And Lily said something about notes in German in Bradford's quarters."

Both had the decency to leave before the Commander embarrassed them any further.

He just chuckled as they left. If they were going to leave once everything was done, then he was certainly going to make fun at their expense while he could.

A massive thud was heard as a large corpse hit the ground, before Ron put his boot on top of it. "I have conquered this mighty bitch! Next!" Ron's uniform was in ruins, he was covered in cuts and he was pretty sure his left eye wasn't supposed to be purple.

"You're fucking INSANE."

"It was the most fun I've had since this debacle began. And DAMN, do I want a repeat!"

"Maybe in future stops along your journey."

"I doubt it. This bitch only comes around once a lifetime. Unless I use the holodecks, but I HATE holodecks."

"Wait, what?"

"If it can be done on a holodeck, it's better done in real life. Like getting assimilated. The simulations only go so far."

"I… I see…"

Ron walked away, and Sheridan could swear he heard the Jaws theme playing in his ears as the man walked away.

Well, it was fitting. Man was a shark when it came to ripping things apart.

* * *

"So… we have a way to hit them hard?"

"Possibly," Tygan informed, showing them the report from their experiment with the recently captured psionic gateway. "When Lily sent her Gremlin through, there was a moment where it was in between locations, we could see images of what may be another world… the aliens seat of power, somewhere we here at earth couldn't access… until now."

"But it shot ROV-R right back out," Lily said, as she continued to fix up the damage to ROV-R, Jaden handing her a wrench. "It needs some kind of specific organic signature to allow anything through."

"That thing we killed?" Jaden asked.

"Possibly. But we need more information before we launch a strike team. Plus, even if we hit their base of operations, it will only be an annoyance. We need to attack globally, Commander."

Sheridan agreed. "The _Ra Cailum_ will provide us with global strike capabilities, and that new NX cruiser will ruin a few alien lives. Just not the crew on that ship; I like his crew."

"We've already managed to get contact with virtually _all_ resistance cells across the world," Bradford said, "If we can coordinate a global strike with them, _plus_ a strike to their central command center could cripple them."

"Alright - first thing's first, Tygan - learn what you can from that thing." Sheridan said, "If it's our way in that portal I want to know how it works inside and out. "

"That, we can do, Commander. We have access to records from the _Ra Cailum_ , which indicate that this device is similar to an Iconian gateway. The only difference is that this gateway uses psionics to guide the travellers to the destination."

"And the avatar project?"

"I think that thing Larcei and everyone killed was the result."

Sheridan blinked. "What?"

"The Elders are dying, Commander: their own psionics are slowly but surely killing them."

And information from the _Ra Cailum's_ visit to the OTHER universe indicated that they wanted to use humans for new hosts.

"So that thing is their attempt to ensure their survival," he muttered. "Vahlen, work with Tygan… find out how it works… and how we can kill them faster."

"Sir!" An officer walked in the room. "Priority message for the commander on a secured channel - it's coming from the ADVENT Network tower!"

"On screen!" Bradford said, glancing at the Commander. "He's taking a big risk contacting us like this…"

The main screen shifted, as the image of the Council Spokesman appeared. " _Hello, Commander,_ " he spoke. " _You and your crew are to be commended. Your efforts in rebuilding the resistance network and uncovering the truth about the Avatar Project have been admirable. I only wish I had better news to report._ "

"When does he ever?" Lily muttered.

" _ADVENT is not taking the death of an Elder lightly,_ " he continued. " _And in turn, they have greatly accelerated the final stages of their Avatar Project. A plan is now in place for the rapid processing of all non-essential human life to begin immediately._ " Everyone seemed to visibly recoil at that. " _Very soon, the ADVENT Speaker will announce a breakthrough in Gene Therapy. A final treatment for the human condition. Billions will flock to gene therapy clinics across the globe. They will never return._ "

The screen then displayed images of the Network tower " _I have managed to secure tactical data and access codes to the ADVENT network tower. The Speaker's address will be broadcasted live to a global audience via this facility. The whole of ADVENT's network will be listening. It is this hubris we must use against them. The Information I am sending you should allow Doctors Tygan, Vahlen and Chief Engineer Shen to take control of the transmission, and disrupt their entire network from within._ "

" _Though my hope is that this disruption will confuse the enemy's forces long enough to allow your final assault a chance of success, I ask one more thing of you._ " He said, leaning forward " _Take what you have learned, and let the world know what is happening here. Wake them up. Broadcast the truth before there is no one left to listen._ "

Suddenly there was a loud banging noise, as they saw what looked like a door behind the spokesman begin to break down. He glanced back for a moment. " _It seems we are both out of time,_ " he said, reaching under a desk to pull out a sidearm. " _Farewell Commander, Starfleet._ " The door busted open as he turned around, and opened fire on the ADVENT Troops, before the screen faded to black.

"20 years of war," Bradford muttered. "It ends today. Get Captain Pinkerton on the horn; we're going to finish this once and for all!"

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: time to finish this once and for all! One final effort to kill those alien bastards!**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Yep. Time to end this with a bang!**

 **117Jorn: IT'S THE FINAL COUNTDOWN! Dodododo, dododododo, dodododo…**

 **Takeshi Yamato: …**

 **Well, I know I probably overuse this meme, but…**

 **HA Anderson: Well, you know what time it is! *RAPE appears in big white letters***

 **Ja Ne!**


	23. Chapter 23

**Time/Date: May 23rd, 2035**

 **Location: Earth orbit, Federation starship _Ra Cailum_**

* * *

"This is a global attack operation! We're pulling out anyone that can hold a phaser rifle to kick these bastards in the face. Today, we're retaking Earth!" MACOs, UNSC Marines, Alpha Team, and other personnel stood in the shuttlebay, ready to deploy.

"I expect nothing but the best from all of you. Just as you expect nothing less from me. I will be joining in on the attack on the ADVENT headquarters as soon as the transmission goes out. Vivat et Foederatio sociis!"

"OORAH!" came the reply shout from the UNSC Marines, which was soon echoed by most everyone else.

Most of them carried the new-modular phasers. They were short, a middle ground between type-2 and type-3, with a foregrip near the end of the barrel, resembling the XCOM SMGs they were based on.

The biggest difference, however, was that they had a near infinite number of configurations. It could be turned into an assault rifle with optional 30mm grenade launcher, a shotgun, a DMR, a long range sniper cannon, an LMG and, with the addition of a stock/external power cell, a full-power heavy machine gun.

And this was simply the tip of a _very large_ iceberg that was about to hit ADVENT. The UNSC and Colonial forces were all prepared to deploy, armed to the teeth with everything they have to offer, and their combat-ready ships ready to provide orbital bombardment support anywhere across the globe once the lights turned green.

Raptors were armed with photon missiles, shuttles and runabouts had rollbars with torpedo launchers fit, vipers were loaded with guided missiles and overwing unguided rocket pods and the two sabers were ready for atmospheric flight.

In short, Starfleet was preparing for war.

And Jaden was impressed. The explorers quickly turned into lethal soldiers, with Ron joining in on the assault on the ADVENT GHQ.

"Starfleet can really get into combat, if you prod us enough," Larcei remarked. "Remind me to show you historical programs on the Dominion War once we get back, if you haven't seen them already."

He hadn't. But if the Dominion War was anything like the war with the Covenant…

Holy crap, Starfleet was scary.

"I'll have to read up on that then." Jaden nodded.

"Same here," Lily said, as she attached the Gremlin onto the back of his suit. "Okay, so I've made a few mods… basically when this guy's on your back it can function like a hoverpack, I strengthened the repulsorlifts so they can lift 10 times your armor's weight, so you should be good."

"Thanks Lily," Jaden smiled, grabbing his helmet. "Sure wish you were with Halsey when she built the MJOLNIR, would've done some real miracle work."

Lily blushed slightly, as Larcei smirked behind Jaden. "T-Thanks, Jaden," she said. "Just… promise me you and Larcei… you both come back in one piece, alright?"

"I'll do my best," Jaden shrugged, "But don't worry - I'll keep Larcei safe."

* * *

"Do I really have to get back in the suit?"

"Sadly, sir, yes." Sheridan knew the whys: the Avatar could only be controlled by someone in the damn suit, and it would take too long to make another one for, say, Takeshi or even Ron.

But that thing gave him nightmares. He apparently spent decades inside it. He wasn't exactly looking forward to another day.

"Do I… fucking hell…" Sheridan groaned as he picked the suit up. "When this is over, we are _burning_ this thing - alright? I don't want to see this thing again for as long as I live!"

"I'll send it to Captain Pinkerton; he'll know what to do."

"BURN! IT!"

"Ooh, did someone mention fire?" Everyone looked at resident engineer and apparent pyromaniac, Commander Sonja Henderson. "You're putting the suit back on? I thought I was working on something else."

"We are highly pressed for time, Commander Henderson. We do not have the time for an alternate method." Sheridan groaned before Tygan continued. "No matter how much the Commander wants nothing to do with the suit."

"I'm taking that suit when we leave. I have… _plans_ for it."

"And the way you said that makes me fear for the multiverse at large."

"So long as _I_ don't see it again, I don't care what you do with it." Sheridan said as he finished sliding inside the suit.

"Roger that," Sonja replied. "Alright, I'm assuming the team that'll hit the tower is ready to go?"

"All set and ready."

* * *

The tower was heavily guarded. But when one goes up against a MACO, a Colonial Marine and XCOM's best team, you had to expect victory. Especially when the MACO was named Homura Akemi.

Madoka had asked her to help Ron, and Homura was never going to deny Madoka anything. Besides, she had the best chance of getting in and killing everything.

"I won't fool you all into assuming we'll go in undetected," Kelly said to the assorted team in the Skyranger, "But when shit hits the fan, no matter what happens we are _fucking ADVENT_ a new one today! We do not leave until we are positive Shen's little surprise works!"

Homura checked her new modular phaser rifle, currently in the SMG mode. She had the extended barrel and grenade launcher for the AR, which could be removed easily. 50 extra grenades, another power cell and a gift from Ron: a customized RPD with cryogenic cooling.

He preferred to use that one over weapons like the M60 and MG42, but the latter just made better akimbo shooting.

" _Approaching the dropzone,_ " Firebrand said, as the Dropship was placed into hover mode " _Good luck out there people! Kick their asses!_ "

Kelly nodded as he and his team leaped down from the ropes - Homura ignored them as she just hopped out and landed gracefully on her feet before the Skyranger flew away.

"Seriously, how the fuck did you—"

"I am not… entirely human. It is complicated."

"Just kill the x-rays and not us." Kill the things that weren't human. Homura'd been doing that for over five centuries.

"Tell your snipers to take up overwatch. I will sneak through their lines and hit them from behind. While they are confused, take them down. Quickly."

Kelly nodded. "Sounds good," He gestured to Isabella and nodded towards one of the buildings. The Sniper nodded as she used her grappling hook which sent her flying over to the location in seconds, before activating her Ghost armor's stealth ability. "Do your thing Homura."

Homura put her hand on her shield, tilting it and stopping time, simply walking past the enemy forces. They wouldn't know she was there until it was too late.

For them.

Isabella had already set up her sniping spot, and what seemed like one second later there was a sizable explosion in one of the buildings as ADVENT trooper corpses went flying. The MEC's and ADVENT soldiers moved to figure out what happened - but their confusion bought her the time she needed to deliver three cracks from her plasma sniper rifle, and three ADVENT Officers hit the deck with their heads missing.

"The fuck did she do?"

"Homu over there can stop time. She probably screwed them over in milliseconds!"

They were correct in assuming that. Homura was currently duelling a sectopod, and winning thanks to stopping time repeatedly and shooting at key places with her RPD. The robot fell down, unable to fight against the time traveller. She removed the 100 round drum magazine, expertly reloading the Soviet-designed firearm.

"Akemi to Alpha Team. You may begin advancing."

"Copy that, moving up." Kelly nodded as they continued forward into the network station, deciding to screw stealth. If they didn't know they were there before, they did now.

* * *

Five of the aliens' Roswell saucers flew through the atmosphere, hunting for the Avenger. They were about to encounter their worst nightmares.

A trio of small fighters, one man in each approached, firing particle cannons at the craft before letting loose a volley of missiles, which shredded through the hull of the lead craft, debris falling to the ground.

"Nice shot, Apollo! Splash one UFO!"

" _You know what UFO STANDS for, right, Starbuck?_ "

"Don't really care," Starbuck rolled her eyes as she banked the Viper VIII left as the other four Roswell's split up as the two Viper's chased after them.

Apollo fired two more missiles, sending another Roswell crashing into a mountain, exploding in a fireball. Kat fired a burst of phaser and autocannon fire into another one, which sent it crashing down to somewhere in the Sahara desert.

"Damn, this is easy! Ra Cailum, Starbuck: can you patch us through to Alpha Team?"

"Commlink online, Lieutenant. Go ahead."

"Alpha Lead, Starbuck: mind telling me when we can stop pussying around and hit the bastards on the ground?"

" _Soon, Starbuck,_ " Kelly informed, " _We're preparing to hack the command console soon - just make sure they can't send any more reinforcements our way by air!_ "

"Hot dog and his team have that handled!"

* * *

True to Starbuck's word, Hot Dog and two other Vipers were shooting down dropships like they were candy being downed by a child, wreckage impacting the ground like two ton bricks. "Alpha Actual, Hot dog: skies are clear. Hack that fraking thing before we start running out of targets!"

" _Having trouble, Hot Dog?_ "

"Yeah: we've been shooting down transports for five minutes straight!"

" _Just keep it up for a -_ " Kelly began to say, before he paused. " _Wait, nevermind. Homura took care of it. Hacking now!_ "

Hotdog watched as the network tower suddenly lit up with a bright yellow blast of psionic energy, and suddenly the Dropships began to drop like flies down to the ground below, and he could even see ADVENT Troopers and MEC's collapse into motionless hulks immediately after.

" _Oorah it worked!_ " Kelly shouted, " _Returning to Firebrand! Mission complete, can't wait to see the look on ADVENT's face when Shen's little gift starts up!_ "

The Vipers flew back up, heading back to Galactica for refuelling and rearming.

* * *

Ron stood in front of a screen, holding a massive tub of popcorn. "What the hell are you doing?"

"Getting ready for the show. I bought more if you want some, Bradford."

Bradford said nothing, instead just grabbing another tub and taking a seat. When you deal with crazy, it's better to just surrender.

The central officer heard loud slurping, again coming from the captain, who was also holding a large cup with a straw. "Seriously?"

"I take my movie watching VERY seriously, buddy. It's Dr. Pepper."

" _...ADVENT assures us that this Gene Therapy breakthrough will be available to all citizens,_ " the news reporter informed, " _We now go live to the speaker for more!_ "

The screen shifted to the Speaker - an obvious thin man as he stood behind a podium infront of a large TV screen. " _Fellow Citizens,_ " He began, " _For 20 years we have put our trust in ADVENT, in the Elders - because we believed a better future is possible for all. Today, that trust, that belief, has been rewarded._ " The screen behind him displayed some simple propaganda images of ADVENT soldiers standing with civilians, switching to another one with half a dozen saluting to the camera with the Elder statue behind them… but for a brief moment, the screen shifted to a similar image, only the ADVENT soldiers were missing their helmets, revealing their inhumane faces, and the city in the background in flames, stunning some of the audience members who saw it.

"Here it comes…" Ron muttered, practically giddy as he munched on more popcorn.

" _ADVENT Peacekeeping forces are traveling across the world, carrying the greatest gift from the Elders._ " The Speaker continued, oblivious to the images being projected behind him. Showing ADVENT Dropships flying in formation, before the screen shifted to ADVENT forces attacking Refugee camps and settlements, further horrifying the people.

" _A revolutionary gene therapy, yes. But so much more._ " He continued, as the image of a gene therapy clinic behind him shifted to images from the ADVENT Blacksite, where humans were shown to be processed, melted down in green tubes, tested and experimented on, and how ADVENT Soldiers are truly created. " _This is an end to disease, to pain, to decay, the beginning for a new tomorrow. Available to all of us today. Truly humanity finally takes its rightful place amongst the stars._ "

" _No thanks to you._ " A new voice said, causing the Speaker to whirl around - as he finally realizes what was being displayed behind him, before a new face appeared. This one belonging to none other than Commander Sheridan, who did _not_ look pleased.

" _My name is Commander Adrian C. Sheridan, of the Extraterrestrial Combat Unit, otherwise known as XCOM,_ " he spoke. " _People of Earth… you have been lied to for 20 long years._ " The images continued to play out as he spoke. " _The aliens invaded our world, abducting and slaughtering our people, and now the ADVENT have been trying to exploit you in order to serve their alien masters! These gene therapy treatments are nothing but the Elders selecting humans who meet their criteria… and exterminating the rest._ "

" _This. Ends. NOW!_ " Sheridan shouted, slamming his fist down, " _We are not the Elder's lab experiment! We are not some different race, we are fucking humanity! And it's time we rise up, and kick these assholes OFF OUR WORLD!_ "

The Speaker frantically tried to cut the feed - but the next thing he knew, he was being trampled on by an angry mob of citizens.

"That was a great show! Who else thinks so?"

The ENTIRE bridge crew cheered at Ron's question.

"There, fun's over; time to get to work. All ships, this is Pinkerton: you see an ADVENT facility, troop convoy or whatever, you BLOW IT THE FUCK UP! Time to erase their asses off the face of the planet! Commander, I believe it's time for us to pay the Ethereals a visit."

" _I agree,_ " the Avatar which contained the Commander's mind informed, priming the Psionic amp in his hands. " _This retaliation is long overdue._ "

Both commanding officers left the bridge, Ron picking up his sword and phaser rifle on the way out. "Oh, and Bradford? Enjoy the popcorn. You're in for one HELL of a show."

The central officer sat down, placing the tub on his lap. "I know I will, captain. Good hunting."

"Oh, the hunt will be GLORIOUS."

* * *

The _Torrens_ and _Hiroshima_ fired their phasers at an alien battleship, hacking it apart as easily as a hot knife would butter. The Ethereals had decided to make the newcomers pay, and sent up every space-capable ship they could. But really, the only threat they posed was to the Colonials.

Which really wasn't much, given the new shields, as _Galactica_ and _Pegasus_ turned to engage the enemy, launching all of their Vipers. The two colonial battlestars turned - revealing their full broadside of kinetic and phaser-based weapons at the incoming Ethereal fleet. Once they were certain there were no friendlies between them and the enemy… Adama gave the word, and unleashed hell upon the alien fleet.

The battlestars' 600cm kinetic energy weapons fired, sending 8-ton slugs at the enemy warships, one of which was outright destroyed by the fire volley. If the Ethereals existed in the other universe, fighting the Colonials would have been suicide, even before the introduction of shields and particle weapons.

And that wasn't counting the juggernaut known as the _Ra Cailum_ , which fired its' phasers once or twice, sending alien craft to the ground in flames. The ground battle was the hard part. This was pathetically simple.

* * *

The Psionic gate activated, as Sheridan's Avatar walked through - and was quickly joined by Jaden, Jane, and Larcei followed behind him. " _Stay alert - no way to know if they detect our… presence..._ " the squad paused as they looked at the large holoscreen being displayed just before them, displaying live images from earth as ADVENT forces began to fight back against the rising resistance.

" _Such loss,_ " A psionic voice spoke, " _Such needless waste, You force our hand, yet still we offer peace. Rejoin us, and your world will be spared._ "

"Yeah, I'm just going to ignore everything that bitch says," Adrian muttered, glancing at the others. "Come on - we still need to blow this place to hell."

A pair of ADVENT troopers took a bullet each to the head courtesy of the Benelli in Larcei's hands, stealth no longer being an option. Now it was just time to run and gun.

Which they did, gunning down a muton and several sectoids as they rushed through the facility. "What's wrong, assholes?!" Jaden shouted, "Didn't expect the asskicking of your lives?!"

" _You harbor such blind hatred for us, we cannot understand it._ " It continued to spout. " _Our intentions for your world were never hostile. They are still not. You are a part of us._ "

"Yeah? Tell that to all the people you've melted down to create _these_ ," The Commander gestured to his Avatar form. "Sounds pretty hostile to me."

Explosions were heard deeper in the facility.

(BGM: Sarge's Blues from Red Vs Blue Revelation)

"SIMMONS, GIVE ME A FAT BEAT!"

In typical fashion, Ron had decided to come in the back, and brought the idiots with him. Red and Blue Teams were rushing in the facility behind him, shooting at every alien in the place.

"Surprise, motherfuckers!" Ron shouted, "Time for all of you to get a taste of your own medicine! And guess who's the doctor giving the injections?!"

"Sure took you guys long enough!" Jaden shouted, as a pair of Archon's flew into the room - only to be gunned down by the new arrivals.

" _So many lives risked to bring you back to them, Commander._ " The Ethereal continued to ramble, " _And for what? More war, more death, truly you were meant for something more._ "

"I joined XCOM to kick alien assholes like you off our planet," The Commander growled, firing his phaser rifle at an incoming Muton - incinerating it. "Right now, that's all I want."

"OH ETHEREALS! COME OUT TO PLAAAAAY~!" Jaden had an idea what the captain was going to do to the poor bastards.

And for once, he actually pitied the poor bastards. No one deserved to be on the other end of Ron's psychological breakages.

Except maybe the leaders of the Covenant. They deserved a little breakage.

Thuds were heard as sectopods joined the fight, firing their gauss cannons at the allied forces. Sadly, personal shields tend to make them useless, as proven when Ron ran up one, taking fire the whole time, before hacking off the cannon and the left leg that went with it.

"You accuse my father of being stupid enough to go to melee range, yet you do the same thing, Uncle."

"It is not the same. I've got destroyer-grade shields, he usually doesn't carry a PSG. Sometimes I wonder whether or not he WANTS to get himself killed."

Larcei sighed, shaking her head even as she used her new Fusion Blade (having given her earlier Plasma Katana to Takeshi) to slice a Sectoid in half.

Jaden meanwhile saw a swarm of Chryssalids come charging towards them, and he rolled his eyes. "Fucking bugs…" he muttered, pulling out his own M90 Shotgun as the Aliens rushed him. The first shot sent the first Zombie-bug flying backwards. Pumping out the spent shell casing, he fired off another shot, blowing another one away.

"Come on, boys! You can do better than this! I mean, REALLY. You had 20 years to upgrade! Instead… you STAGNATED! I mean, you're easier to take down then the last ones!"

The psionic voice seemed taken aback. " _What?_ "

"We kicked your ASSES once before. Alternate universe. I was there. And I ENJOYED it."

Mocking the Ethereals seemed like a bad idea. But Ron was full of bad ideas. And this was why the XCOM people LOVED him.

"My Uncle, ladies and gentlemen," Larcei quipped. "The ultimate asshole."

"Asshole… Extraordinaire!" Jaden shouted as he grabbed a Chryssalid by the neck, squeezing it before it's head popped off. "But he's an asshole who knows what he's fucking doing!"

"We~ kicked~ your asses~! I am your worst fucking nightmare! Come on, boys! You want me? Come down and get me!"

* * *

Bradford was enjoying the show.

Starfleet was kicking the crap out of the aliens, and he was laughing his ass off at the mocking Ron was giving the Ethereals.

Admittedly, though, the man's singing was HORRID.

Bradford suspected that that was just another tool in his psychological warfare kit.

He looked at the Geoscape as the fighting continued across the world. Everything was going better than he had hoped - Starfleet's forces plus their allies were straining ADVENT supply lines and reinforcements, making the fight for the resistance groups all the more easier - and with UNSC forces providing extra ground support, it was almost a cakewalk. Of course Bradford wasn't complasant, they had to be prepared for anything to go wrong… but was it wrong to feel a bit of pride over the fact that after 20 years… the Aliens were getting a taste of their own medicine?

"Central, we got another contact inbound!"

"Shit! Prep for evasive maneuvers, people!"

And he was enjoying his popcorn, too. Fucking aliens were going to pay for this. The Avenger bucked as the engines failed, and the ship fell out of the sky. "FUCKING ALIENS! I'm gonna kill them! They ruined a good movie!"

"SPARK!" Lily shouted, as the SPARK Prototype lit up in activation - now bristling with Starfleet weapons. Lily's own GREMLIN also floated around her as she picked up her rifle. "Time for some action!"

The red lights kicked in. "Sir, limited radar cover restored. We've got a couple of dropships, inbound. The support craft are too busy, so we're going to have to fight off whatever they're sending our way."

"Damn it." Bradford grabbed his HK416 and joined the defense. His popcorn, buttery and tempting as it was, would have to wait.

* * *

Jaden's shotgun finished off a Sectoid that tried to get into his head before the Reds collectively gunned down a Muton and a sectopod.

For a bunch of idiots, they were kicking ass.

Of course, Larcei was doing her own brand of butt-kicking, as her Fusion Blade stabbed through an Archon, killing it and setting the corpse on fire..

A shieldbearer was shoved through a wall, thrown by the living tank that was her uncle.

A living tank that started coughing up blood. "FUCK! The Borg couldn't finish the job with my liver and kidneys, could they?"

While the nanoprobes had given him the strength to lift up a runabout, they didn't make his flesh any more durable. Under the shields, he was just as easy to kill as any other human. And right now, he was suffering from internal injuries.

His fight with the Berserker Queen opened up a few old wounds, and this was making it worse.

"We need to get you an evac, Ron?" Jaden asked. Even Larcei looked worried.

"No, I'll be fine. I just want to kill those fucking Ethereals." He turned to Larcei, who was beginning to speak up. "And lecture me on my cursing, and you will NOT enjoy what I will do to you, niece or no!" He spat out more blood, Button pushed.

"Great, he's going to get himself killed at this rate." Jaden watched as Ron literally tore apart a sectoid with his bare hands. "Should we stop him?"

"I don't think we can at this point," Larcei remarked. "All we can do is keep an eye on him, and let Rutia know to be on standby.

"Already done." A psionic explosion caught their attention as the morons were thrown back.

Stepping out in the wake of the explosion was a second Avatar body.

"Oh, great, they had more than one," Larcei remarked, priming her blade and her gun. "This is gonna suck."

Screaming was heard as Ron ran at the Avatar, who used a psionic wave to try and force him back, but the older human reached the Avatar and grabbed the being's arm, pulling on it and using his foot to rip the arm out of its' socket before grabbing the Avatar's head before ripping it the hell off.

"HOLY FUCK!" The man coughed up more blood, falling to his knees. "I am going to find you assholes. And I am going to make you SUFFER! DO YOU HEAR ME?! YOU WILL FUCKING SUFFER FOR THIS!"

"…okay, _someone_ sounds angry." Jaden muttered.

"Understatement of the century, Jaden-kun," Larcei sweatdropped.

"Come on," he reloaded his shotgun "We gotta help him before he gets himself killed."

The Reds finally got up, Sarge holding his head. "Simmons, what the hell hit me?"

"A psychic thing, sir. My head hurts."

Sarge reloaded his M90. "We need those fancy shields, people. Then we'd be invincible!"

"ENOUGH!" A purple beam lanced through the facility, fired from the opposite side from a VERY angry psionic.

And it was an Ethereal. "You have interfered for the last time! We will not tolerate this any longer!"

"Then come and fucking get me, you INFERIOR REJECT!"

The Elder paused. Apparently Ron's pushing of buttons was getting to them.

"I think you pissed it off—SHIT!" Jaden shouted, before the Ethereal let out a swarm of Psionic energy - he pushed Larcei down covering her as the energy flashed around.

"GOOD! I WANT IT MAD!"

The captain ran at the Ethereal, screaming in his rage as his skin actually began to tear.

This proved one thing: Ron was not invulnerable.

He was just harder to kill than most.

"Idiot!" Jaden stood up, glancing at Larcei. "Stay down!" He leaped over his cover as he rushed the Ethereal - diverting power from his armor to his shields to take the extra damage.

The Spartan saw what was happening to Ron, and wasn't liking it: the shields weren't keeping out all of the psionic energy. The skin on his fingers began to blacken and flake, and his uniform began to burn from the Ethereal's onslaught.

But that did not stop Ron. "HEY, FUCK FOR BRAINS! ENJOY!" The tubules extended from Ron's hand, making contact with the Ethereal's skin. The contact only lasted for a moment - but that was all Ron needed as he pumped as many Nanomachines inside the alien before he was pushed back by a Psionic push.

"Surprise bitch!" The Ethereal looked up as Jaden flew upwards with his GREMLIN acting as the jetpack, flying up towards the Ethereal and punching it in the face - punching off its metallic mask.

The alien staggered, as it floated back up. It felt… something, inside it, but paid it no mind - focusing all of its power on the SPARTAN as it lashed out with its Psionic powers, grappling the SPARTAN.

"JADEN!" Larcei cried out, getting out of her cover.

" _You… will kill… HIM!_ " The Ethereal declared, as it attempted to take over his mind… before it physically recoiled. Memories flashed before the Ethereal's eyes, of another galaxy, of another race, fighting something… an enemy which did not rest, a threat which came… like a Flood. And with these memories, was a name. "Re… claimer?"

Ron blinked - the Nanoprobes inside the Ethereal allowed him to see/hear what it saw, and it confused the hell out of him. The Captain pushed it out of his mind. And recited words he never thought he would say.

"We are the Borg. Your biological and technological distinctiveness will be added to our own." He growled out, as the tubules retracted. "Resistance is futile, motherfucker!"

The Ethereal screamed, but Ron had bigger plans. "You're connected to everything," he said, stepping forward. "Sectoids, ADVENT troopers…" He smirked. "Well, looks like I get to conduct mass genocide after all." He glared at the Ethereal, the newly formed implants bending its' will to his own.

Jaden stood back up - his head throbbed in pain ' _Things need to stay OUT of my head..._ ' he thought, before looking up at Ron - who stood over the downed Ethereal which started… changing.

"Jaden!" Larcei ran up to him. "You alright?"

"Yeah… " He looked up at Ron. "But… the hell is he doing?"

"Remember that old mind-merge thing the old Sectoids used to do?"

"Yeah…?"

"Think of this like a network-wide version. And when the one that's boosting the others dies… they all die." Ron pulled out his FN Five-SeveN and did a brief brass check. Still fully loaded, sans the bullet that was fired at Ron and the one in Admiral Cain's head.

So, 18 rounds.

As the Ethereal's changes finished, Ron aimed the gun at the Ethereal and pulled the trigger.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

The Ethereal twitched before emitting a blue wave of psionic energy, which knocked everyone on their asses.

Ron coughed up more blood before laying still, closing his eyes. "Son of a bitch. _Ra Cailum_ , this is Jaden: we need immediate beam up!"

" _We figured, Spartan; Captain's lifesigns are in the red!_ "

"Mind telling me what the hell he did to be coughing up that much blood?"

" _He got assimilated and had a photon grenade blow up in his face, followed by a rampage through the ship that rescued him. You actually did something similar, his was just… more violent._ "

Jaden blinked. "That… makes more sense than it doesn't really," he admitted. "Just get him and us out of here!"

" _Energy field down. Energizing._ "

The assault teams began to disappear in showers of light, leaving only the dead and the dying aliens.

* * *

Bradford's clip ran dry just before the Muton charging at him dropped dead, occasionally twitching. "Ok, what the hell. Avenger, this is Central: mind telling me what the fuck's going on? Enemy troops are dying in droves, and we're not shooting them."

" _Not sure,_ " the person in charge of the Avenger at the moment replied. " _But we're getting reports of the same thing happening all over the planet!_ "

"It's the _Ra Cailum_. Had to be."

" _No, there weren't any reports of torpedo launches from the_ Ra Cailum _, sir: we'd've seen the explosions from here._ " And the agent would take days to spread.

"Mindmerge. Bastard must've made one of them do a network-wide version and killed the Ethereal." And when you kill the booster, you kill the boosted. Well, looks like he got to do his genocide thing, after all.

" _Seems the most likely,_ " came the reply. " _Regardless of how it happened, though, it's over! We won!_ "

"Patch me through to the Ra Cailum: I want to talk to captain Pinkerton."

" _Working on it, sir._ " Moments later, a pop was heard.

" _This is_ Ra Cailum _Actual. Go ahead._ "

"Commander Yamato? What happened to Captain Pinkerton? I was expecting to talk to him."

" _Ron… Ron's in sickbay. Pushed himself too hard and almost got himself killed. Again. And he calls_ me _reckless._ "

"Again? Does this happen a lot?"

" _First time, he was fighting a bluegill on the Llieset. Second time, Vaadwaur Prime. The last time, he took on an Iconian and it nearly killed us both. And that was in the last year._ "

"…Wow…" Bradford remarked.

" _And the worst part is he knows he's doing it!_ " Takeshi replied. " _He knows when he's pushing past his limits, but he does it anyway!_ "

"Guess the rage is one hell of a painkiller. I'll be coming on board in a few hours; we got a LOT of work to do."

* * *

Dressed in her red scrubs was Rutia, who was operating on Ron. Once again, the barely healed wounds inflicted on him by the Borg, herself, Gaul and M'tara were open, and the only thing keeping him alive was his Borg implants.

"I've stopped his bleeding, but I want this son of a bitch off his feet for the next month."

"Shouldn't we use the nanoprobes, Doc? They'd speed up the process."

"And give him the excuse to do this AGAIN. FUCK NO!"

"Y-yes, Ma'am," the orderly replied.

The doors to sickbay opened as Takeshi entered the room, finding Lily, Jaden, and Larcei looking in on the operation. "How is he?"

"He took the brunt of dozens of hits, psionic and otherwise."

"He's a tough bastard."

Rutia pulled off her surgical gloves, walking out of the operating theater through the sterilization field.

"Commander, I've operated on liberated Borg before. They can barely take a tenth the punishment he took today. And every time I check the database, I get nothing. Mind telling me how he can keep getting back up in a week when it would take another liberated four while a normal human would be killed instantly?"

Takeshi just blinked. "Damn," he muttered. "I always knew he was a tough bastard, just didn't know how much."

"And that's the odd part. Only an Augment can take that sort of punishment, but I've combed through his DNA a dozen times in two years, and I get no signs of obvious genetic tampering."

Jaden raised a hand. "His parents?"

Takeshi shuddered. "PLEASE, never speak of his mother."

Lily looked to Larcei. "What's going on?"

"Great-aunt Ayame scares the shit out of my father. There is no other way to say it, because it literally happened."

"ONCE! IT HAPPENED ONCE!"

"And we're never going to let you live it down, Takeshi," Luna remarked with a smirk.

Takeshi just sighed and hung his head. "Sadists… the lot of you…" he moaned weakly.

Rutia shuddered. "Met the woman once; NEVER want to meet her again." She pulled up a picture of her, as well as part of her biographical profile. Lily and Jaden had to admit one thing.

Besides the red left eye and the black hair, she was a near-clone of Riza. "So, old picture?"

"This is CURRENT. The lady's in her late 70s and she looks barely older than her daughter!"

Larcei blinked. "Wow, I knew Grandma Ayame aged gracefully, but that's…"

"A bit much, I know," Luna remarked. "And no-one knows why."

"Grandparents?"

"Dead. They served on the C." Luna winced. "Sucks to be Aunt Ayame."

Lily blinked. She realized something. "C? As in seventeen-oh-one-C?"

"Yup, they died at Narendra 3. Left their daughter in the hands of the Hawke family. Which explains many things."

"Getting tired of the confusion here. What the hell are you talking about?"

"I'll need to show you the episode of Star Trek The Next Generation that covered it," Larcei told him. "Tou-san doesn't like it."

"It's bloody confusing, is what it is," Takeshi replied. "Time Travel, with very rare exceptions, always makes my brain hurt with trying to wrap my head over everything that happens-has happened-will happen-you know what I mean!"

"Ironically, the only human we know of immune to temporal paradoxes is currently resting over there. Funny thing, too. Their names just appeared out of nowhere in 2327 in the Starfleet registries and Federation census."

Jaden thought this looked familiar. "Sounds like an ONI operation. But you don't have an ONI."

"Starfleet Intelligence doesn't pull secret crap like this. After a few years, they usually declassify operations. The Romulans were PISSED about what happened to Vreenak in 2389."

Takeshi's eyes narrowed. "True, but I think we all know who **_would_** do something like this," he said. Luna nodded.

As one, the two uttered, "Section 31."

"Who?"

"Think of them like a rogue ONI. They do things that no sane federation citizen would do: assassination, blackmail, operations that destabilize entire governments. They claim to help the Federation. Personally, I just want them gone."

"The only reason WE aren't on a crusade is Ron. He tolerates their presence, even though there's probably a Sanjuichi operative on board."

* * *

In one of the crew quarters, a woman with long red hair sneezed.

* * *

Lily scoffed. "Paranoid."

Jaden shook his head. "Not really; ONI sneaks people in all the time." He informed.

"Section 31 does, too," Takeshi remarked. "Honestly, though, they may claim to help the Federation, but they're still one of the worst organizations I know."

"But your captain doesn't care."

"No, not really. If anything, they fear him because they know he WILL destroy them if he cared. He just doesn't give two shits about them."

"He could destroy them, he just doesn't want to?"

"More or less."

"…remind me to try and sic him on some ONI people I know," Jaden said with a dark chuckle. "Make the UNSC a better place when we get back home." The others all gave him odd glances. "Hey, I've spent _way_ too much time with you people, your craziness is starting to spread."

"Commander, Central Officer Bradford is requesting to beam aboard to speak with you, as is Commander Sheridan."

"Let him beam on board. I'll talk to them in Ron's ready room."

* * *

Takeshi sat in the chair Ron normally occupied in the ready room, waiting for Bradford and Sheridan.

"Commander, thank you for your help in liberating Earth. I'd thank Captain Pinkerton personally, but he's… recovering."

"You could say that. In a week, he'll be his old self again. Mr. Bradford, I heard you were planning on coming with us. Something about continuing to be useful?"

"You could use a tactical operations officer, Commander. And Vahlen's planning on taking over your science labs."

Takeshi grinned. "And her decision to join has _nothing_ to do with your own decision, I'm sure," he said.

"Will you quit it?!"

"Believe me, Central, I'm nothing compared to Ron. He claims he can smell it when I… well… you know."

A hologram of Ron appeared out of nowhere. "Claim, no. I CAN smell when you've had sex with my stepsister. Don't ask me how."

"And here's me forgetting about that transceiver in your spine. So, learned your lesson?"

"About retuning my shields to deal with psionic bullshit, yes. At least I USE shields, Mr. Samurai."

Takeshi sighed. "I'm starting to take sidearms with me on missions, you know!" he remarked.

"Not good enough."

Sheridan chuckled "Either way, like we said… thank you, all of you," he said. "We couldn't have achieved this victory without you, at least not as easily."

"You're quite welcome. Now, if you excuse me, I have to deal with my physical recovery. Takeshi and I have a sparring session in two days, and I'm not cancelling." The hologram faded away.

"Your captain is a strange man."

"With an equally strange background. Something to figure out later, Commander. Good luck."

* * *

 **One Week Later**

* * *

With the ADVENT all but defeated, and the Ethereals gone, the _Ra Cailum's_ fleet of multi-universal starships remained in orbit around Earth as they helped the people of earth get back on their feet - purging out old ADVENT/Ethereal symbols, architecture and replacing it with the more… human touch. Using the technology they had provided with them, and the tech captured from the ADVENT, they were steadily regaining a sense of normality. Of course, nothing will ever be normal again for them… but it was a start.

Ron sat down in his chair. "Status report." "All ships are ready for jump. Still not happy about the lack of warp capable ships to boost our speed. Our ETA to home, sans repair time, is going to take years, if not decades." "Well, it's fitting that this ship is _Odyssey_ -Class. Open a channel to the Avenger."

Corpsa tapped the keys on her console. "Channel open."

"Avenger, this is Ra Cailum. Requesting permission to depart."

"Avenger _to_ Ra Cailum. _You are cleared for departure._ " Adrian replied, as the NX-class Cruiser orbited around Earth. " _Good luck out there Captain._ "

"Same to you, Commander. Riza. Punch it."

His sister pressed a series of buttons before the ship's warp nacelles flashed, the ship and her fleet moving forward through the wormhole.

The Odyssey continues.

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: As of August 30th, we are now at 23 chapters, over 50K of text, and have crossed into four separate universes, five if you separate XCOM 1 from XCOM 2. DAMN, this is fun to write!**

 **117Jorn: Yup! And we're gonna keep on going - and on to the next universe- *loud rumbling sound* …did you guys feel that?**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Yeah, I think things are about to get hectic again.**

 **117Jorn: Well everyone, we gotta deal with this. *Sound of a chainsaw is heard* Until next time!**

 **Ja ne!**


	24. Chapter 24

**Time/Date: Unknown**

 **Location: Unknown, Federation starship _Ra Cailum_**

* * *

The fleet dropped out of the wormhole, the Ra Cailum's nacelles aglow with blue light.

This was not a good thing. "Son of a bitch! Vent the plasma! VENT IT!"

The Ra Cailum began venting its' plasma from the nacelles, green gas venting into space. "Ok, we REALLY need to get something to help our warp engines. We can't do that again."

"I agree. We're going to need to run a census. Sonja, find out which ships that can shape a usable warp field. If we can modify them, do it. Take, talk with your counterparts in the fleet; they need to know."

"Understood, Ron," Takeshi informed, even as Sonja fired off a "Got it, Boss." The two headed off for the turbolift.

"Kim, Cassie, sensor scan. I want to know what we're up against."

"Already on it, sir. Preliminaries indicate no signs of hostile ships, no hostile space creatures… Looks like we're finally getting a break."

Ron got out of his chair. "A break would be us already home."

Luna nodded. "That or Starfleet getting us some backup, at the very least," she remarked.

"That's true enough. Cassie, anything further?"

"Still processing the details, Captain, but I am picking up a number of planetary bodies. One is Minshara-Class, approximately 15 light minutes away. Orders?"

"Let's take our time. Riza, one-tenth impulse power; might as well take a break before our next adventure."

His sister scoffed. "If there is one."

"This is the _Ra Cailum_. We ALWAYS go on some form of adventure."

Luna chuckled. "True enough," she said. "The fact we're the _Enterprise_ 's sister ship doesn't help much."

"If you'll excuse me, I'll be in sickbay. I have a few old wounds to seal up."

* * *

Matt walked into main engineering, seeing the massive Class-15 warp core that powered the massive superdreadnought. Nearby was the secondary dilithium chamber, which housed the dilithium that fuelled their accidental wormhole drive.

"Mitod, you there?"

"I'm over here, by the EPS conduits. What is it?"

"Sonja just gave me a heads-up," he told her. "We're gonna need to start seeing if some of the other ships in the fleet are capable of generating a stable warp field."

"We're going to be busy. The _Ra Cailum_ 's been through a beating in the past few months. I still have to reinforce the section that Covenant destroyer rammed into, gravity plating's malfunctioning on Deck 39, and your commanding officer wants us to upgrade the _Firestorm_ 's helm controls. _Again_. Perhaps he doesn't get the idea that he can't outfly the captain's sister just yet."

"Maybe," Matt replied, before pausing. "Also…" he began again, blushing even if Mitod couldn't see it, "if… if you have some free time tonight, would you… would you be up for dinner in my quarters?"

"Maybe. Depends on how long my shift lasts. Sonja's going to be riding my ass."

The doors to main engineering opened, and the woman in question entered. "We got a lot of work to do, people. Matt, I want you to help out with the warp field project. No more personal projects until this is over; we nearly lost the warp nacelles when we dropped out, and we cannot afford to lose them, unless any of you don't want to see home ever again?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"We're going to be pulling triple shifts. I know all of you hate doing that, but we need to get something to boost the ship's warp field, or we're all going to be stuck in the next universe we visit. I'll be revisiting the field repair manual: we might need to rebuild the warp coils."

"Yes, Ma'am," Matt said with a sigh.

Triple shifts.

Well, there went his date plans with Mitod for the foreseeable future.

"Mitod, Matt, deck 12, section 56. Both of you."

"That's in the port nacelle."

"Yes. And I want you both in there to make an examination. I'm needed down here for field modelling."

On the other hand, hot warp plasma conduits made VERY good heating elements…

* * *

If there was ANYONE Takeshi didn't want to spend time with, it was Saul Tigh.

He reminded the Japanese native of Aunt Ayame, in a way: they drank equally as much. It was bringing back unwelcome memories.

"So what the frak is this about? More upgrades?"

"Sort of," Takeshi admitted. "We would have lost the warp nacelles after that last jump if we hadn't vented the plasma like we had." He sighed. "We need to take some of the load off, so we're looking into seeing if any ships in the fleet here can generate a stable warp field, at which point we can start equipping them with warp drives."

"Like booster engines?"

"More or less. _Galactica_ and her sisters seem to be perfect for the job."

The Colonial shook his head. " _Galactica's_ a warship, not some kinda sled!"

"Colonel, if the _Ra Cailum's_ warp nacelles overheat like that again, we will lose them. We are literally at the limit, and knowing our luck, we're going to pick up more refugees."

"Maybe you should tell your captain to stop picking up hitchhikers, then."

"Unfortunately, one of Starfleet's founding principles is to help those in need," Takeshi replied. "If that means evacuating them from whatever hellhole they're on for whatever reason, then that is what we'll do."

"Well, then you're askin' for it. I'll talk to the Old Man. But he won't like it anymore then I do." The Colonel pulled out his flask, downing a large amount of alcohol from it. "I need to get back to _Galactica_ , and I don't trust those fraking transporters worth one damn."

"There are people in our own universe who don't trust them," Takeshi informed. "Anyway, when you tell Adama about this, make sure to mention what we've told you - we're literally out of options here. We'd find some other way if we could, but this is the only way we can keep going."

Tigh left, and Takeshi groaned. The Colonials hated the idea. The UNSC ships were more than willing to do it, but they ran into the same problem they did in designing warp-capable ships: poor hull design.

They were USELESS for forming a warp field that could exceed warp .9, and they needed to get to warp 4 at least.

" _Henderson to Yamato._ "

"Yamato here," Takeshi replied. "What's up?"

" _Just finished a quick runthrough of the ships in the fleet. You will not be happy with what I found._ "

* * *

On the _Firestorm_ , it was pretty much business as usual for the enlisted and junior officers - namely, hanging out in the crew lounge and chatting about various things.

"Another universe, another problem. How bad's the warp drive?"

"Pretty bad. They actually shut down the warp drive to fix the warp coils. Looks like they suffered extreme overheating."

"Aren't those things designed to handle temperatures up to 20000 degrees kelvin?"

"Yeah, which tells you just how bad the overheating was," a Male Ferengi crewmember said. "Apparently Commander Williams and Lieutenant Mitod are in there right now checking conditions and replacing components. I'd bet about 20 bars of latinum that they start making like the Yamatos before their shift is out."

"Near a warp plasma conduit? They'd fry in minutes."

"Have you seen how he is around her?" the Ferengi rebutted. "I have, and no way are her pheromones involved with his behavior. He's working up the nerve to make a move, and you yourself said they'd be near overheating plasma conduits."

"Oh, god, why are the only people on this ship not interested in sex the captain and his sister?"

The ones at the table grinned. "Oh, god, if you're all thinking—"

"He doesn't touch Commander Yamato, and he sure as hell had the chance. Then there's that blonde."

"His daughter? He won't do it."

"She's not his daughter. Come on, everyone knows it."

Unfortunately, the idiots didn't know Mami was listening in.

* * *

"The _St. Elizabeth_?"

"That is LITERALLY the only ship in the fleet that can be modified with warp drive to make a difference. But even then, it'll just be warp 2.1."

Takeshi sighed. "Jeez, this situation is just getting worse and worse. We need Starfleet to find a way to send us backup, and pronto. I never thought I'd be saying this, but I'd even take help from my mother-in-law!"

"While I have no problem seeing my mother again—"

Takeshi actually started crying, sobbing loudly.

"We need more options."

"And we do. _Phoenix_ -Class colony ships are simple in design. We just need the resources."

"We BUILD more of them?"

"Modified with warp drive and actual weapons systems. We need more living space, too. Besides, fit them with holodecks, replicators, and the like and we'll have ourselves a party."

Luna chuckled. "Just so long as we have an assortment of foods available for the same, and we make sure EVERYONE has a variety." She glanced at Takeshi. "No eating nothing but Ramen day-in-day-out."

"Come on, it only happened once!" Takeshi whined.

"As did you shitting your pants. Yet we keep reminding you of it. Point is, it's not—"

BANG!

Takeshi looked at the door. "What the hell was that?"

"THAT was the sound of a musket being fired. I think Mami's mad."

The door bent in slightly. "And mad at me. I suggest leaving through the jefferies tubes."

"We're gone," Takeshi replied, as he and Luna opened the hatch. "Good luck with her."

"Oh, I figured."

* * *

 **Location: Earth, Sol System, 'primary' timeline**

 **Stardate 87875**

* * *

The _Ra Cailum_ had been missing for six months, and one man was privately celebrating the loss of Captain Pinkerton and his crew of misfits.

He was about to regret it.

He discovered this as the front door to his office was battered down by two **_very angry_** women. One a brown-haired asian female, the other looking like a black-haired version of Riza.

"Councilor Yamato. Is there something I can do for you?"

"Yes. Captain Pinkerton, as you're the more… vulgar of us…"

"Of course." The woman walked up to Edward Jelico's desk.

And promptly grabbed his head before slamming his face into the polished duranium.

Ryoko Yamato - who had gone by Ryoko Hibiki for a time when she first entered the political field - winced, understanding just why her brother feared Captain Ayame Virgilia Pinkerton.

When the woman was angered, she was a force of nature.

"Councilwoman?"

"Well, that wasn't what I was expecting."

"My son and I share something: you can't predict what we're going to do."

Jelico lifted his head up, touching his bleeding nose. "You—"

"Shut up, Jelly boy. My son is missing and what are you doing?" She picked up a bottle of Saurian brandy. "Celebrating! Our best people are missing and you're fucking DRINKING! Give me ONE good reason not to let the crowd inside!"

"I doubt that he can, Captain Pinkerton," Ryoko remarked. "He's always let his emotions cloud his judgements. Like now, where he refuses to act on the data the Tholians gave us about what they've been up to."

Jelico blinked. "…Crowd?" Ayame whistled, and the doors opened. In came several personnel: KDF, Romulan republic Militia, Starfleet, Kobali, Kazon… the Delta Alliance had decided to pay him a visit. Even the Vaadwaur sent someone: Eldex himself.

Leading the mob was Captain Va'kel Shon, captain of the first Odyssey-Class ship to come out of the yards after the _Ra-Cailum_ : the _Enterprise_ -F.

"Hello, Admiral Jellico," a Klingon said, cracking his knuckles. "We all would like a _word_ with you…"

The Admiral's screams of pain lasted for hours, and could be heard halfway across the planet. Hell, they could hear him up in Earth Spacedock.

* * *

Quinn wasn't pleased with them. "Councilwoman, while I applaud what you did to Admiral Jellico, I officially have to condemn it."

"I didn't beat him up," Ryoko remarked.

"Captain Pinkerton the Elder here forced me to commit him to an asylum for the criminally insane after what she did! I'm not even sure WHAT she did; the security footage was erased after that!"

"Partly because it wasn't just her," Ryoko replied. "And no, like I said, I wasn't involved in any way. Suffice it to say that the good Admiral was subject to Earth's first true lynch mob in centuries."

"I get the feeling you only did this to get my attention."

"And you're right. Admiral, the _Ra Cailum_ is missing. The Tholians gave us the data. And Jellico literally takes the data and sits on it. I want him arrested."

"On what charge?"

"Besides being a complete fucking tool?" Both turned to the second-most-feared commander in the fleet: Ayame Pinkerton. Her son recently took the top spot.

She was pleased by that. No so pleased her children were missing. "Sir, he purposefully took the data, sat on it for three months and it took the first real lynch mob since the Terra Prime bullshit to get what we needed, all because he wanted to make my son and his crew disappear. That's corruption _and_ attempted mass murder."

Ryoko nodded. "Honestly, I'm surprised STIG hasn't carried out a hit on him yet," she remarked, referring to the Starfleet Technical Intelligence Group, rumored to be the legitimate cover identity of Section 31.

What she didn't know was that Sanjuichi had been waiting for the ideal opportunity for such a hit, and was even now moving against Admiral Jellico in the mental hospital. The man wouldn't survive to stand trial, or even be arrested. Not that anyone in Quinn's office knew that at the moment.

"Point taken, Captain. What you did is punishment enough. And he seems to have… united many people, in spite of being a complete and total asshole."

"He bonds with people best under fire. My son-in-law did so, and became his XO years later. The KDF, RRM, Kobali, Kazon, Benthans, Cooperative, even the Vaadwaur and to a lesser degree the Iconians: all of them fought alongside or against him in some way or another and they're all stepping up to bat saying 'let's find him'. Sir."

Quinn nodded. "Understood," he said. "We'll start putting together a task force ASAP as we go over the data. I'll want you in charge of it when we're ready to deploy, Captain Pinkerton."

Ayame scoffed before leaving. Quinn facepalmed. "As stubborn as her parents."

"You knew them?" Ryoko asked.

"I met them a year before they died on board the _Enterprise_ -C. They were… unique. Her mother once survived a 30G environment for days, if not weeks. Her father… was just as ruthless as her son and her."

* * *

"My agents are already on their way, Uncle," a brown-haired woman said to the director of STIG and Section 31 combined. "Jellico will be dealt with soon enough."

"Dealing with him isn't the problem. The Clan Pinkerton is. You know how important they are."

"They can beat the crap out of Q. So what?"

"My dear, my predecessor in S31 had files on her parents. And there's a damn good reason we faked their genetic tests when they entered the Academy. I'm going to send you and one other agent to join Project: Odyssey."

"Understood," Admiral Hayate Yagami of STIG replied. "I'll make preparations. Should I take the _Arthra_ , or the _Examia_?"

"We need the extra firepower, and a _Chronos_ -Class ship will aid in their return. Just make sure they get back here in time for Procyon 5."

The woman didn't understand how he could be so damned important to that battle. "Also…"

"Sir?"

"I'm going to have to have Quinn promote the good captain to Admiral. As much as I know you don't like it, that man is in charge, and having a higher up there would...confuse matters. Besides, I want to test him. The man's S31. He just doesn't know it."

"Understood," Hayate replied with a bit of a sigh. Ever since she'd joined Section 31 and STIG, Hayate had only followed the orders of her adoptive uncle, Director Gil Graham. And even then Gil let her act on her own discretion most of the time. As the head of Special Operations Section 6, STIG's elite black ops unit, she _needed_ that leeway, and had come to thrive in it.

Following the orders of someone else, especially the deadliest man in Starfleet, would be… vexing, to say the least.

"Don't worry. He'll grow on you. His grandparents did to my predecessor, and his mother did to me when I was part of Intelligence. That family's gift is to bond with people under pressure and be completely unpredictable."

"I know, uncle; I read reports about Captain Pinkerton's charge at Chin'toka. Crazy bitch killed more Breen than anyone else, including the Klingons. Her son is… very similar."

"That's the only thing you can predict with them. Usually, whoever they run into dies and you never know what they'll do next."

* * *

 **USS _Ra Cailum_**

* * *

"I wonder what she was mad about," Takeshi wondered. "Still, alternate realities or not, she's definitely got his temper."

"That… might be what this is about."

Takeshi looked at Cassie, whose hologram had appeared seconds after locking the entire area down. "What?"

"She overheard some members of the crew talking about Ron's real identity. She knows he isn't really her father."

Takeshi sighed. "Great," he sighed. "Of all the ways she could learn it, overhearing it in conversation is the way with the highest chance for screwups. What were the crewmen in question discussing?"

"Relationships among the crew, actually," Cassie replied. "It actually started when one of them placed a bet that Matt and Mitod were going to start behaving like you two in-"

"Okay, that's a bit TMI," Takeshi said, cutting her off. "Still, Matt and Mitod? That seems a little unusual."

"It devolved from there, suggesting that Ron would, well…"

"Ok, once this is over, find them. We'll let Ron deal with the idiots. Besides, man's practically asexual; he wouldn't touch an Orion virgin even if she was offering freely and without a catch."

"He did deny one once." Takeshi looked at Luna in mild shock. "I don't tell you EVERYTHING about my life prior to marrying you. He took me on a trip to Drozana Station once before the Academy. He can tell you the rest."

"I'll ask him," Takeshi replied.

A large explosion rocked the ship, but it wasn't enough to breach the hull. "What was that?"

"Tiro Finale, Mami's most powerful Puella Magi attack. She's trying really hard to kill him."

* * *

Ron dug himself out of a pile of debris. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were trying to kill me."

Mami didn't say anything, though the look on her face said enough as she lifted what appeared to be a giant matchlock musket that she was currently using as a club as she tried to slam it against Ron - barely missing him as he rolled out of the way - but leaving a very sizable crater where he was moments ago.

"Mami, I know I lied! I had a damn good reason!"

"You aren't my father!" She cried out. "You lied to me!"

"I'm not the man who sired you, but I AM his quantum counterpart!" He reasoned - even as he ducked under a musket shot. "That's good enough! And what would you prefer me to do, let you go insane?! Kill everyone or kill you? I don't do that shit to people who've been victimized!"

"I TRUSTED YOU!" She shouted, before delivering a kick which sent him flying into a wall - forming a very Ron-shaped dent in it. He didn't have the time to move before Mami was upon him again, before she began to punch him. "I! WANT! MY! FAMILY! BACK!"

She kept punching him, starting to cry as her hands started to bleed from punching the ex-drone.

Even with his shields set to minimum, she was suffering for it. She kept up her assault, wondering why he wasn't attacking back. He could kill her if he so wanted. One final punch to the face and she dropped her hands to her sides.

"Why?" she muttered, crying. "Why did you just… take it?"

"You're angry and confused," he sighed. "Hell, if anything, you did what I would do. Actually, you… DID do what I did. I understand how you feel."

"…how?" Mami asked, her eyes red with tears as she finally looked back up to Ron. "How… do you know… what _this_ feels like?"

"Because I lost everything I cared about when the Borg turned me into a drone!" He shouted back, "Killed or assimilated my crew, and a woman I was growing to love turned me into a borg! Kyubey destroyed your life just like the Borg did to me! I know how you feel! And I don't want you to lose the chance to be somewhat closer to normal than I am. I mean, look at me!"

Mami did. Ron was never going to be fully human again. At least she had some better chance. "And to be honest… I might meet your mother's counterpart. IDIC is a bitch."

"IDIC?"

"It's a Vulcan philosophy. Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations. It means anything's possible. So… sorry about lying. I just did it to protect you from yourself."

Mami was silent for a long moment, glancing down at her feet. Ron didn't move an inch… but blinked when suddenly, she enveloped him into a hug. "…huh?"

"You talk like my dad," she said, burying her face into him. "Look like him, act like him… y-you may not be him, b-but… " she looked back up at him, "y-you're… t-the closest t-thing I've g-got to… to a f-family… "

"So. Are we done with you trying to kill me?"

Mami started laughing. "I-I think so."

"Good. So, mind telling me what set this off?"

"Your crew. They… said some things…"

"Right. Well, time for me to start hurting people. I do NOT tolerate idiots, especially on my ship."

Mami blinked. "You're mad at them?"

"Mad at them for giving you the wrong idea. I was going to tell you when I thought you were ready for the truth. Contrary to your belief, I don't like lying."

Ron left the room after punching the damaged one out of the way. "Your style could use some work. I'll teach you some things I know later."

* * *

"Come on, stop trying to hit me and hit me!"

"You watch the Matrix too much, Jaden-Kun!"

Jaden couldn't help but smirk slightly as he blocked a few strikes from Larcei as she sent a flurry of kicks towards him. In order to pass some time, Larcei had suggested going back to their old training regime he started back when she was three and before the… accident. Granted it was much different now, since she was older and could do a lot more than she could before, but Jaden still had to hold back due to his augments. Also sitting to the side was Lily, who decided to watch.

Larcei came in for another attack, but Lily decided to… contribute, discretely, by throwing something on the floor right in Larcei's path, causing her to trip and slam into Jaden, as they ended up in an… interesting position.

He was under her, their faces millimeters from touching, her legs spread over his waist. While they were wearing combat uniforms, it was VERY easy to picture them out of them in that position. And Lily was resisting the urge to laugh, instead, playing matchmaker. "You two ok?"

"Yeah… just… fine." Jaden's face was beet red, feeling that odd sensation he felt before when his augments were fixed by Rutia, but… stronger now.

Mentally, Larcei knew Lily was behind it, and thanked her for the attempt to get them closer. Outwardly, she blushed as she nodded. "Y… yeah…" she said. "Just… surprised there, is all…"

"I-I… U-umm… y-you can get off, r-right L-Larcei?" Jaden asked, wondering why Larcei hadn't tried to move off of him yet… though part of him didn't want to-dammit, where was all of this coming from?!

" _Pinkerton to Takeo. I'd like to talk to you in a few minutes. Sparring room five. And this isn't an option, Spartan, if you get my drift._ "

Eager to get away from the strange and back to comfortable grounds, Jaden managed to get up from under Larcei without hurting her. "Sorry, Larcei, but—"

"I know. I'll talk to you later! Sorry!"

"Fine!" Jaden nodded, before leaving the two alone in the room.

"Nice play," Larcei nodded to Lily.

"I thought so," the Engineer giggled, before she frowned. "But… he still seems pretty eager to stay _away_ from either of us… you especially."

"Maybe he doesn't understand." Larcei shrugged. "I mean, Spartans are child soldiers, right? It's not like they know anything about sexual attraction. He could be scared out of his mind."

Lily had to agree. Jaden was seven when he became a Spartan. So he probably didn't have any idea.

Ron would solve THAT problem.

* * *

A carbon fibre kilij impacted a similar katana as Ron began to duel Takeshi in a traditional kendo match. "You seem to be a LITTLE pissed off, Take."

"Gee, you THINK?!" Takeshi replied. "I learned during the stop where we picked up Madoka and her counterparts that you read my mail to my sister!"

"Oh, that. Come on, Take. Your encryption was basically telling me to walk in."

"You call THAT an excuse?!"

"No, I'm saying your computer skills suck."

Takeshi growled. "Alright, then…" He then charged forward, screaming, "HAVE AT YOU!" before swinging at Ron in full berserker, as angry as Ron in Button Mode, and that was saying something.

The blade connected with Ron's head, and Ron simply let him have his revenge.

It would teach him to connect his private files to the main library computer.

After a few minutes, Takeshi dropped the practice blade. "Are you done?"

Takeshi panted for a few minutes. "Yeah…" he said with a sigh. "I'm done. Man, that felt good, though."

Ron got up, cracking his neck. "Ok. I'm going to talk with Jaden now," he said. "Your daughter's… interested in him. And because you suck at threatening people—"

"I suck?" Takeshi rose his eyebrow. "Ron, your mere _presence_ is enough threat."

"Fair point. Someone's got to threaten the kid with physical force, and I'm the only real choice in the matter."

Takeshi nodded. "Alright," he said. "…Kinda hard to believe that she's old enough to develop feelings like that… I'm going to have to trust that she knows what she's doing, I guess…"

"I'll deal with him." The doors to the room opened, and in came the Spartan. "Trust me. When have I ever let you down?"

"Point taken," Takeshi admitted. "See you, Ron." He nodded at Jaden as he walked past him. "Spartan."

"Commander," Jaden nodded as they passed, before he was left alone with Ron. "Captain, you wanted to see me, sir?"

"Yes. I figured I'd test my mettle against the UNSC's finest. After all, you and I are probably equal in terms of endurance. I just want to see where we differ."

"you want to fight me?"

"Yeah, that's it in a nutshell. So, let's have at it, shall we?"

Jaden rose an eyebrow. He felt that something else was going on here… but hell, anything to take his mind off of Lily and Larcei, the more he thought about them the weirder it got. "Sure, might as well." He nodded, cracking his hands. "Got nothing better to do."

Ron simply stood straighter. "Your move." Jaden sent a punch Ron's way, but the captain dodged with some difficulty before sending a similar strike, with similar results, although Jaden had to redirect it to miss his shoulder. The fat man was fast, he would admit that. "I saw your little fight with Larcei." He said, as they walked around one another, waiting for the other to make their next move.

"Spying on us, Captain?"

"Takeshi lets me keep an eye on Larcei," he said. "Most of the time. You were distracted. You could've just moved her off of you. But you didn't. And I know why."

"Really?" Jaden blinked, before shrugging. "Eh, don't worry - I'll see Rutia about it later."

Ron tilted his head in confusion. "Wait… what?"

"I think the fixes she did to my augments are doing that… weird thing," he said. "I get this weird feeling whenever I was around that green girl Mitod, but it's stronger whenever I'm around Larcei or Lily… either way, she's the best doctor in the fleet, so she should figure it out."

"You're a fucking idiot, Spartan. Did you ever know what that implant in your thyroid did?"

Jaden thought about it for a moment. "If I remember correctly… something about enhanced growth hormone," he recalled. "To boost growth of skeletal and muscle tissues to help boost bone tissue formation and effectively strengthen the bone structure."

"It also suppressed your libido, you **_idiot_** ," Ron groaned, rolling his eyes. "Your sex drive is fully active, and you're thinking about Larcei as more than a little sister. Won't blame you, she IS a beautiful woman now."

Jaden blinked, letting that process for a moment… his face reddened, before shaking his head. "No, that can't be it," he said. "There is nothing going on between either of us. If its a problem I'll get Rutia to fix it."

Ron landed a punch to Jaden's face, hard enough for the Spartan to actually be dazed and fast enough that he couldn't dodge it. "It's not a 'problem'," he said. "It's biology. You can't just switch off your libido any more, you can't ignore it. What you were denied as a teenager is coming out full force. I'm sorry."

Ron suddenly was hit in an upper-cut by Jaden - sending him staggering back slightly. "I'll keep it. Under. _Control_." He said, with a slight growl. "Sir."

"I'm not lecturing you, Spartan," Ron adjusted his neck. "You want to date my niece? Fine. Just warning you. If you hurt her, it won't be Take you answer to. It'll be me. And tritanium beats ceramics. And just be DAMN sure you actually love her like she does you."

Jaden growled. "I DO," he shouted, before delivering a kick into Ron, "That's why I'm staying the FUCK away from her, and everyone else! She'll live longer!"

 _This_ comment caused Ron to pause, looking at the Spartan. "…Live longer?" he asked. "The hell is that suppose to mean?"

Noble Six sighed, shaking his head. "Captain… you never read my file, did you?" He asked. When he shook his head, he continued. "If you did… you'd know there's a reason they call me the UNSC's Grim Reaper. It's why I stick to Lone Wolf ops… every team I'm ever a part of, any group I'm working with… dies."

"You've been involved in operations with us. What's happened? Injuries. Sure, there have been a few losses. But that's expected—"

"LARCEI COULD'VE FUCKING DIED IN THAT GATEWAY!" Jaden shouted, sending his strongest punch into Ron's gut. "She would've been ANOTHER. FUCKING. FAILURE! BECAUSE OF ME! I lost Echo Team, I lost Eclipse Team, I lost Jasmine, and I fucking lost Noble before you guys showed up! Fuck, I lost my whole goddamned FAMILY before I even _became_ a SPARTAN! Anyone I grow up with fucking DIES!"

"Oh, ENOUGH with the survivor's guilt, Jaden. I ask myself the same fucking questions every fucking day. Why am I free instead of my crewmates from the _Tempest_? They deserved it more than I did. I'm just an asshole! You think death hates _you_? **_EVERY_** time **_I'm_** on the doorstep, he rejects me! Why the hell do YOU think I go for the most dangerous shit?! I'm trying to protect my crew! And here's something you probably haven't heard." Ron delivered his strongest punch to Jaden's face, actually causing the Spartan to bite his tongue and cracked the actual bone in his jaw.

" ** _Risk! Is! Our! Business_**! She wants to be near you? **_FUCKING DEAL WITH IT!_** Otherwise, shove your ass out the airlock and spare me. I've got enough angst for the entire crew." Ron walked around Jaden, grabbing his uniform. "Think about that while you get your jaw fixed. I actually cracked the bone."

Jaden grunted as he left, but said nothing… he admitted, Ron had a point… in fact, this was the first time he realized how… similar, they were… risk was always part of a SPARTAN's life just as much as it is to a Starfleet officer. His thoughts drifted towards Larcei and Lily again… but he shook them away.

' _This isn't about me,_ ' he thought, as he got back up to his feet. ' _This… is about keeping her safe._ ' he touched his jaw, wincing in pain slightly as he headed for the door. ' _Fuck he gives a good punch…_ ' he walked away, heading towards the sick bay to take care of his Jaw before trying to find the next thing to keep his mind off of… all this. If he had been paying attention though, he would've realized behind him, a certain pair of figures came out of another door having hidden in the closet when he left… and heard the whole thing.

"So… not only has he never experienced a sex drive until he met us…" Larcei whispered, "he believes himself to be a curse of death to anyone who tries to get close to him?"

"That… explains a lot," Lily said, sighing. "If what he said was true… can't really blame him…"

"Maybe not…" Larcei agreed, "but he's thinking too lowly of himself." She sighed, before turning to the other person she'd fallen in love with. "Lily… I can only think of one way to try and break his mindset."

"…I think I know where this is heading," Lily said, before shrugging. "And… hell, I've got nothing. Wait till he's done with Rutia?"

Larcei nodded. "Yeah," she said. "And screw protection - if we end up starting an actual family through this, well, I'm fine with that."

* * *

' _Starfleet medical tech is the stuff of legends,_ ' Jaden thought to himself, scratching his jaw which no longer hurt like a bitch from his and Ron's… sparring match, as he returned to his quarters. His room was… okay, he supposed. He was told it was designed similarly to the rooms on a _Galaxy_ -class starship like the _Enterprise-D_ was, and were large and spacious. Personally, Jaden didn't like all the space - he had grown accustomed to the tight cramp quarters of military ships like the _Jericho_ and _Saratoga_ , simple and practical. And he also didn't like how he had a perfect view of space out the window - windows were structural weaknesses, even though UNSC ships used them on their bridge they were always well protected. But one well placed shot could vent the atmosphere.

Then again, he just assumed that Starfleet just… had a different way of thinking things through. Their first contact was peaceful, unlike the UNSC's. Besides he's seen what this thing could do in combat - glass being damaged was the _least_ of his worries.

Putting his stuff down, Jaden groaned as he dropped onto bed, palming his face, thinking of what Pinkerton had told him. ' _I'm TRYING to keep her safe,_ ' he thought to himself. ' _I have to keep my distance from her… and Lily too._ '

The door chimed, signalling someone wanted in. "Who is it?" He called out.

" _It's me, Larcei - and Lily._ " The familiar voice spoke, " _Can we come in?_ "

Jaden groaned, the last two people he wanted to see right now. "Can it wait?" he asked.

" _It's… kinda important, Jaden-Kun…_ " Larcei reasoned, sounding… worried?

Again, the Spartan groaned. "Fine, come in."

The door opened, and the two women came into the room. "Hey there, Jaden," she said. "Finish getting patched up after being worked over by Uncle Ron?"

"Your Uncle punches like a Brute on steroids," he muttered. "And that's putting it _lightly._ " He glanced up at them. "What's up? Something wrong?"

Larcei sighed… before she walked up to him, bent over to bring their faces together… and touched her lips to his.

Jaden blinked, it took him a few moments to process what was happening… before immediately backing away "WHOA! What the fuck Larcei?!" he shouted. "What the fuck is that about?!"

"We overheard your conversation with Ron while you were sparring with him," Larcei replied. "You think too lowly of yourself, Jaden-kun. And you don't need to worry about me - or Lily, for that matter."

"Wha-" he looked at Lily, who blushed slightly. "Oh for the love of - Larcei! You are better off staying as far away from me as humanly fucking possible! If you did listen, you'd know any team I work with DIES, and there wasn't a damn thing I could do to stop it!"

"Jaden-" Larcei began, but he wasn't finished.

"When you went through that gateway, I thought I'd failed AGAIN," he shouted, standing back up. "Another person I cared about probably dead, and there wasn't a damn thing I could've done to stop it! I won't let that happen again, dammit! Not again!"

"And it won't!" Larcei replied. "But you're being too hard on yourself, Jaden-kun! Punishing yourself for things beyond your control! I refuse to let you do that to yourself anymore!"

"You don't know what it's like, Larcei," Jaden shook his head. "To have the people you care about… people you grew up with… " he paused for a moment, looking down, "People you… considered family… who were there for you when… you had nothing else, just… picked off… one by one… " his fists clenched. "And you… can't do a damn thing about it. It keeps on running through your head… over, and over… in your dreams, nightmares… asking, what you could've done differently… what… what _I_ could've done… to save them… but… but it… never… changes… "

He sat back down onto the bed. "They're dead… they're all dead…" he muttered. "Kyle… Marco… Jasmine… Taylor… Zack… why did they… have to die… and I just… keep living…?"

"I honestly don't know the answer to that question, Jaden-kun," Larcei replied softly, sitting next to him on the bed, even as Lily sat on his other side. "But Lily and I are willing to help you find that answer… together…"

"Larcei… Lily…" Jaden muttered, looking at each of them. "I don't… If I lost you… _either_ of you, I… I don't…"

"You won't lose us," Larcei promised, as Lily nodded. "We promise… and your sentiment holds true for us regarding you, you know."

"We need you, just as much as you need us," Lily smiled, moving closer. "You saved me from Julian, helped free my home… this is the least I… _we_ can do for you." She then leaned forward, and gave Jaden her own kiss. Only this time, Jaden didn't recoil away. He just… adjusted, he wanted to say no, to keep his distance like he always does… but this still felt… right. Slowly tearing away his resistance at the thought.

As the two kissed, Larcei hugged them both. "We love you, Jaden," she said. "We both do… Just like I love Lily, and she loves me, we both love you just as much. "Please… let us help you…"

The last of his willpower finally caved, it may have just been for a moment, for just one moment… he wasn't a SPARTAN-III, he wasn't Noble Six, the Lone Wolf, or the UNSC's 'Grim Reaper'. Now… he was just Jaden, in the arms of two of the most beautiful women he had ever met. Might he regret the decision later? Maybe… but for once he wasn't worried about the future… he just wanted to live in the present, because for the first time in a long time… he was happy.

In less than ten minutes, none of them were clothed, as Cassie and Ron threw up sound dampener fields around their quarters and cut most video feeds. The three would continue for a while before resting, as they prepared to face the future… and face it together.

* * *

While everyone was working on the warp drive problem, Sonja was working on the power problem. Expanding the warp field like that drains a LOT of power, and they didn't exactly have an unlimited amount of deuterium. As such, Sonja was working on Plan B, codenamed Fuck You by the boss: a subspace capacitor. It would take energy from subspace, and channel it into a storage device, which would give them near-Omega levels of energy.

She hadn't had time to work on it, too busy keeping the ship from blowing up in their faces, but now she was labelling it a priority: they couldn't construct more Class-8 warp cores, but with the subspace power cells, she could power a small fleet of Phoenix-Class colony/warp ships.

Speaking of warp drives…

"Where the hell are those two? They were supposed to call in five minutes ago." Mitod and Matt hadn't called in since they arrived at the port nacelle, and she was beginning to get mad.

"Something wrong?" She glanced up as Luna walked into engineering.

"Matt and Mitod have been in the port nacelle for a while, and they were suppose to report in like five minutes ago!" Sonja growled, "What the hell is taking them so long?!"

She then remembered the looks that they were sending one another. "Oh, FUCKERY." She activated the PA in the entire port nacelle.

She learned from the best when it came to being a bitch. "STOP FUCKING EACH OTHER AND GET BACK TO WORK!"

She counted off from five before Matt answered. " _What the hell, Sonja?!_ "

"Captain does it to Takeshi and Lunamaria. I figured it'd work on you. I sent you up there to deal with a survey, not to fuck each other's brains out."

There was another pause… before her PADD beeped, and she looked and saw the data from the Survey… along with a side note scribbled with various curses in Orion which basically summed up to…

"Well, the Captain'll be impressed." Sonja said, nodding in approval. "You're FINALLY getting up to his level of coarseness."

" _You're a real bitch, Sonja_."

"Fuck each other on your own time. You're on the clock. Henderson out." She turned off the PA, smiling. "Well, THAT'LL get them moving." The engineering crews looked at their commander. "The fuck are you looking at? Get back to work!"

* * *

Rutia applied another use of her dermal regenerator over Ron's head, sealing the skin and erasing the scar tissue. "You're good. Though I wouldn't ask you to do anything so reckless again."

"Rutia, you know me. I put myself at risk every day just living. Am I good to go?"

"Yes, yes." Rutia nodded, looking at her PADD, "Go on - I've got things to do."

Ron got up, putting on his red undershirt before heading back to the bridge, doing up his vest before putting on his uniform proper. As usual, Rutia told him to take it easy.

And Ron as usual would never listen. He could've healed faster with the nanoprobes, but Rutia didn't trust his ability to control him.

He didn't either. But they would never know.

Still, it seemed as though his body worked better in concert with nanotechnology then it did without. "Pinkerton to bridge."

" _Go ahead._ "

"Prepare to increase speed. It's time for us to figure out what's going on."

Though before he could leave the sickbay entirely, the doors opened to allow Takeshi and Luna admittance.

"Takeshi? Luna?" Rutia asked. "What are you two doing in here?"

"Thought Luna could use a check up," Takeshi admitted. "She's thrown up after breakfast two days in a row so far."

Rutia tossed Ron a tricorder. "Better things to do!"

"Funny." He began scanning Luna, who looked like hell. "Hmm. Should I hit Takeshi now or later?"

"Excuse me?"

"He missed an injection. Again. I'm picking up another lifesign. Unless there's a parasite on board, you're pregnant. Again."

Takeshi and Luna blinked, looked at each other, and smiled. "Well, I guess Larcei's finally getting a little sibling," Takeshi remarked. "Honestly, Ron, it's been hectic enough that I probably have missed more than one injection."

"Well, congratulations, you're off active duty."

"Asshole."

"Regulations. Deal with it. We've got work to do."

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: A bit of filler and fluff this chapter - and looks like Takeshi missed an injection after all.**

 **Ron the True Fan: Time for a little bit of fun. The next arc begins now.**

 **117Jorn: GAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH! *Chainsaw revs as blood splatters into the room, Jorn stepping inside as a corpse falls down* Guys… we've got company…**

 **Ron the True Fan: Cock and lock, boys! We're going in messy!**

 **Ja Ne!**


	25. Chapter 25

**Time/Date: Unknown**

 **Location: Near Minshara-Class planet, Federation starship _Ra Cailum_**

* * *

Jaden groaned, as he finally emerged from his slumber feeling… refreshed, he didn't know why, but he just felt… better. His mind still a bit hazy, he tried to sit upwards - before he felt bodily forms lying on top of him, causing him to pause ' _Wait… huh?_ ' He blinked his eyes open… and quickly realized laying on top of him on either side of him was Lily and Larcei - both very nude… as was he.

And just like that, the memories of last night returned, and his face reddened ' _Oh Fuuuuuuuuuuuk…_ ' he thought, ' _I am SO fucking dead…_ ' nevermind the fact he wanted to stay away from them to keep them safe - but once Ron or god forbid _Takeshi and Luna_ found out about this…

"Mmmm…" Larcei groaned as she stirred, her eyes blinking before she looked at Jaden. "Morning, Jaden-koi," she said with a purr.

"Uhhhh…" Jaden muttered, even as Lily yawned as she started to wake up. The XCOM engineer adjusted her neck, before looking at Jaden, blinking before looking at Larcei.

"…Damn, that _wasn't_ a dream?" she asked, with a bit of a blush on her face.

"No, it wasn't, Lily-koi," Larcei replied with a grin. "It was real. And it was wonderful."

"I am _so_ fucking dead… " Jaden muttered, causing the two to look at him. "Fuck, if Ron finds out - hell if your _parents_ find out, I'll be lucky if they don't skin me alive."

"I doubt they would," Larcei remarked. "They'd want me happy. And with you two, I **_am_** happy."

Jaden groaned. "Larcei…" he said. "I said-"

"We can look after one another, Jaden," Lily interrupted, holding him close. "We won't leave you… so long as you don't leave us. We're not defenseless damsels in distress, afterall."

A bo'sun's whistle went off. " _Good morning, infidels. I see you all enjoyed yourselves._ "

All three froze. They had forgotten Ron was connected to the internal sensors. "Uh, Uncle—"

" _Before you ask, no, I didn't watch you do the deed. I saw part of it last night during my checkup. Apparently, me walking in on people isn't just limited to doors or your parents._ "

Larcei giggled. "You just can't avoid it, can you, Uncle Ron?" she asked.

" _No, I can't. I won't tell your parents. Yet. If you don't tell them soon, though, I WILL. And it will be unpleasant for Jaden. Arrivederci, amore uccelli._ "

The comm chirped off.

"Your uncle is a dick."

"I won't deny it," Larcei replied. "He has his good points, though."

"He prefers being a complete asshole, though."

"Not denying THAT, either. But that's not a problem. He's just trying to protect us."

Jaden sighed "That's another thing we've got in common…" He said, before looking at the two again. "…guess I'm beyond the point of no return here then, huh?"

"Yeah, that you are. Come on. He wouldn't just call us for no reason. I think we're being called up."

Jaden thought about it. Call from Ron equalled call to duty.

"Let's get dressed." He said. "We'll deal with our problems later. I'll take a shower… " he sat up, heading for the shower… Not noticing Lily and Larcei giggling, following him in.

* * *

The conference room was full of people: Admirals Urei and Adama, President Roslin, Captain Drake, and of course, the senior staff, headed by the de facto head of the fleet, Ron. "Lieutenant Takeo is late, Captain. I thought Spartans were punctual."

"I thought so, too, Admiral."

Not too long after saying that, said SPARTAN walked inside - clad in his MJOLNIR armor. "Spartan," Ron nodded "What took you?"

"Someone misplaced my… Armor." He said, **_VERY_** glad his helmet hid the massive blush on his face.

"Fair enough. We've run scans of the planet we're about to enter orbit of." Ron gestured to Sonja. "The planet's suffered some nasty shit: orbital bombardment consistent with a particle beam barrage. The planet is a charred ball of death."

"Covenant?"

"No; this is self-inflicted."

"How do you know?" Bradford asked, before the Holoscreen lit up revealing the planet - before zooming in on what looked like dozens of orbiting satellites.

"X-ray/plasma lasers. It's a doomsday weapon, akin to the planetkiller, but less devastating."

"Planet killer?"

"A neutronium-skinned weapon of mass destruction that can carve up entire planets and consume them as fuel. Starfleet's run into two of them. I've destroyed one, the other involved-"

Vahlen raised a hand. "Let me guess. The _Enterprise_ under Kirk."

"Someone's been studying our historical archives."

"That, and it was featured in an episode of Star Trek," Bradford admitted. "We binge-watched the entire series after we decided to join, see just what we were getting into."

"Which season?"

"Uh, three. Spock's Brain."

The Starfleeters groaned. "THAT was the most idiotic thing the _Enterprise_ encountered. It happened, but it was still stupid. I want you on tactical ops, Bradford: coordinate with the ground team."

"Aye, sir."

"Which will be composed of Jaden, Larcei, and a team of XCOM, Colonial and Starfleet personnel."

"Right," Takeshi replied, looking at his daughter. "Be careful down there, Larcei."

"Don't worry, Tou-san," Larcei replied. "I'll be fine."

"If shit hits the fan, I'll send down Mobius Squadron and whoever wants to join a fighter attack. Don't screw this up. Dismissed."

* * *

 **Planet surface**

* * *

Bullets flew in every direction, impacting their targets. "Can't stop this! Come on, grubs! I can do this all day!" A tall, muscular man shouted, using a rather unique-looking rifle to stab into a grey-skinned abomination clean through, before starting up what seemed to be an under mounted chainsaw to cut the creature apart from the inside out. As he continued firing, throwing out one-liners the whole time, three other soldiers came up to help him, firing their own guns in the process.

"Take down those Locust! We need to save that soldier!"

"Down the stairs!"

One man remained at the top, taking cover near a railing before the other two rushed down, firing their own weapons.

"Bring it!"

One of the two used his own chainsaw 'bayonet' to savage another creature, while the other threw a grenade into a cluster of them.

"Room cleared!" The leader of the men jumped from the upper floor. "Soldier, how are you?"

"Feelin' like shit, sir, but that's not gonna stop me."

"Lieutenant Minh, Delta Squad lead. What's your name, son?"

The man coughed before standing tall and proud. "Private Augustus Cole, Alpha Squad, sir!"

"Cole?" one of the other soldiers asked. "As in the Cole Train?"

"Yeah that's right."

"We're Delta Squad. We're here to retrieve the sonic device."

"And to get you guys out of here."

"Where's the rest of your squad?"

"They're sitting tight over in the tomb. Tried callin' them, but radios don't work for shit. Sir."

Minh ignored the comment. The truth was the truth, after all. "We noticed."

"It's the Seeders," Cole continued. "They're jamming our transmissions."

"Then we'd better make those Seeders our top priority, sir," The third Delta remarked.

"Agreed. Fenix, take point."

Marcus Fenix shook his head, but went on ahead. Four years in prison, all for trying to save his father, a demotion to private, all after decades of war.

His life fucking sucked. 8mm bullets shot over his head, fired from the Hammerburst rifles built and used by the Locust Horde. "Goddamn grubs. Dom, let's tear into them a little." His best friend, well only remaining one, Dominic Santiago, reloaded his Lancer before joining Marcus in outflanking and killing the Locust drones.

They continued killing Locust, before they came across a locked door.

"Jack, decloak and rip this door," Minh said as a floating robot appeared and began to cut through the door.

Screaming was heard seconds later.

"Fuck me. WRETCHES!"

What looked like tiny drones dropped from the broken vents before screaming loud enough to break what little intact glass there was.

"Hold your positions! We cannot let them get to Jack!"

Welcome back to the army, Marcus Fenix.

It's a killer.

* * *

Nearby, eight showers of light deposited a team of the fleet's best wetworkers. "Ok, fun time. We've got shields, but I'd rather not stick heads out when we don't need to. Stick to cover, stick to the buildings if possible. Clear?"

"Sure thing, Jaden-kun," Larcei replied, having already agreed with both Jaden and Lily to not use the 'koi' suffix in public, at least not yet. She hefted a shotgun, and smiled. "Let's get moving."

The ground shook slightly as… something spat what looked like a small inky blob into the air. "Ok, what the frak is that?" "No clue, Mathias, but I do know this. It needs to die."

More shaking was felt before a hole formed under the street, caving in a small section before a reptilian-skinned humanoid crawled out. "GROUNDWALKERS!"

"Ok, they know humans and they want us dead. Weapons free, aim for the head!"

The humanoid died in short order from a blast from Larcei, even as more came up from the hole.

"Seal it!"

Kelly activated a photon grenade before throwing it down the hole. Screaming was heard prior to the hole closing up on itself. "Whoops. Guess I ruined someone's day."

"Let's keep moving," Larcei told them. "Try and find and seal more of these holes, and see if we can run into any friendlier locals."

* * *

Gunfire was heard outside the building, and Minh ordered his squad to halt. "Alpha?"

"Doubt it; they're stuck in the Tomb of the Unknowns with enough grubs to choke Hoffman to death."

As Hoffman was a tough bastard, that was saying something. "Let's move out."

Again, Fenix took point, as they made their way towards the source of the gunfire.

Marcus took cover at a doorframe, peaking through to see a number of people wearing what looked to be black armor. "The fuck? Onyx?"

Minh looked over Marcus' shoulder. "The Onyx Guard? I wasn't told they'd deploy here."

"Lotta lies, Lieutenant. Might as well help em."

"I… don't think they need help, Marcus."

Indeed, the soldiers were tearing into the Locust with shotguns, rifles, a pair of swords, and what looked like fucking **_laser rifles_.**

"Huh. mind telling me where I can get my hands on a mini-Hammer?" The beams fired from the rifles were, indeed, almost identical to the infamous Hammer of Dawn's beam of doom. Marcus wanted one.

"DAMN, that's a nice ass!" And leave it to Cole to fuck it up.

A drone started up its' chainsaw and prepared to use it on the tall one.

Only for the chainsaw to bounce off the tall one's armor, sparks flying everywhere.

"Ok, I want that armor, too." Marcus fired on the drone, putting bullets into the damned thing's head.

"You got nice armor. That new Onyx Guard issue, or are you guys some new elite elite?"

The newcomers turned around to look at him. "Umm…" one of them began, "actually, we're… not from around here. It's… kinda complicated and involves a lot of temporal-spatial-mechanical-physics to explain."

"What?"

"Good one, Lily. I'm Larcei Yamato. We're from the Federation starship _Ra Cailum_ , which… just entered orbit. We beamed down to investigate whatever was going on down here."

"Yeah, pull my finger and I'll shit out rainbow sherbert. Who are you guys, really? Onyx Guard black ops?"

Cole turned to Marcus. "I thought Onyx Guard were black ops."

"As in BLACK ops."

"Oooooh."

Larcei sighed. She tapped her commbadge. "Larcei to _Ra Cailum_ , mind beaming down an ammo crate?" she asked. "We burned through a lot of ammo dealing with some hostile natives."

" _And THIS is why I said phaser rifles_." A shower of light appeared, a box of ammunition for the weapons carryed by the squad appearing out of thin air.

"Magic bullets."

"Not magic, Mr…"

"Oh, Dom. Dominic Santiago, Delta Squad. Where'd that thing come from?"

"It was deconstructed, converted to energy, and reconstructed here."

Marcus decided to show off the fact that while he liked simple, he was a very intelligent man.

He was just very coarse. "You can't know the location of every particle in the universe and where they're going to be all at once. It's impossible."

Lily smirked, moderately impressed. "Smart man…"

"Marcus Fenix. Thanks."

"The transporter's got something called a Heisenberg compensator. Circumvents that little law."

And that convinced Marcus that they _might_ be telling the truth, given that he'd never heard of a lot of what she was talking about.

"Ok, let's give you the abridged. We're probably gonna be working together."

* * *

On board, Ron continued waiting for the team to report in after their request for additional ammo. "Cassie, sitrep."

"We've got a dozen contacts on the ground, moving towards the away team's position. No IFF tags like those soldiers, so they have to be hostile."

" _Ra Cailum_ to ground team," Ron spoke. "We've got unidentified contacts heading your way - keep your eyes open!"

* * *

Jaden listened to the Captain, before nodding. "Roger," he said, before he glanced to Delta Squad - who just finished giving an abridged version of their war with the 'Locust'. "We've got incoming, people! More of those Locust things!"

A number of holes appeared in the ground, with bare-chested drones carrying shotguns and revolvers crawled out. "Grenadiers!"

"Take them out; last thing we need is to be blown to bits!"

Larcei fired her own shotgun, loaded with deer slugs to increase the range of her attacks, taking off one of the grenadier drone's head. Jaden's MA37 unloaded over 15 bullets into the drone, but some barely penetrated, taking a shot to one of the eyes to kill it.

"They got thick skin!"

Marcus revved up his bayonet, using it to hack through another one. "Not thick enough."

"HOLY SHIT!" Jaden shouted, with a grin as he saw the saw-bayonet rip the Locust into meaty chunks. "That's fucking awesome!"

"Pretty much the only way to take these things out close-in. A friend of mine came up with the idea."

Jaden looked at Lily. "Think you convince Ron to add these to the modular rifles?"

"I don't think he'll CARE as long as they work."

Jaden hoped so. He wanted to introduce the Covenant to the chainsaw of DOOM.

Another Locust rose from out of the E-hole, priming its own Lancer's chainsaw as it made a charge at Jaden. However the Spartan just grabbed it by the blade, and breaking it with his fist, seeming to stun the Grub… before he punched the grey-skinned creature in the face, and it fell down dead.

"Come on you freaks!" Jaden shouted, firing off his assault rifle as more grubs showed up. "I can keep this shit up all day!"

The ground began to shake again, and the drones began to retreat. "We were kicking their asses, but they didn't seem eager to run then."

"They've got the advantage: that wasn't an earthquake."

Minh looked at Marcus, sharing the same thought. "Corpser?"

"Yeah. Life just wants to take a shit on us."

"Alright, then. You people better stick with us. We're heading to the House of Sovereigns to rescue a squad of Gears. And we could use the extra firepower."

"Oh come on," Jaden said, reloading his rifle, "How bad could a Corpser-" Suddenly the ground exploded under a building, before a giant six-armed abomination the size of a two-three story building emerged from the ground, with a metal mask as it roared at them.

"…I stand corrected," Jaden admitted. "KILL IT WITH FIRE!"

Red-orange pulses impacted the beast from above as two Peregrine-Class fighters flew overhead, the Corpser trying to reach for them. " _This is Mobius Two: Get the hell out of there, people! We'll distract that thing as long as we can!_ "

"Copy that, Mobius! Lieutenant, lead the way; it's your show."

Minh gestured them to follow closely as they headed for a large building, which reminded them partly of the Congress building in Washington DC on Earth, topped with dozens of domes, partly in ruins. Adorning the facade were eight-cogged gears, the kind you'd find inside a machine.

"Nice building. Needs a bit of fixing."

"House of Sovereigns," Minh explained. "This building used to be a beautiful place, a lot of history here."

Marcus however rolled his eyes. "A lot of lies, too…" he muttered, as Minh glared at him.

"You've got some nerve, soldier," he snapped. "I know all about your trial."

"His trial was a sham," Dom countered. "…sir."

Gunfire was heard from the roof, meaning someone decided to put in a gun emplacement. Made sense. "Up those stairs! Alpha's waiting!" Minh walked to one of the sealed doors, power still running to the door as he put in an access code.

"Next time, we call Ron."

"Rov-r can hack the systems just as easily as he can, Larcei."

"No, so he can punch our way through. No offense, Jaden, but he's a LOT tougher then you are."

"None taken. Son of a bitch actually cracked my jaw yesterday."

The Gears, at least Minh, didn't want to know.

Cole, on the other hand, did. "Damn! I'd love to meet this guy!"

"Knowing our luck, you'll get your chance sooner or later," Larcei told him.

They moved up the stairs, the Locust so focused on shooting at the tomb that they didn't hear them come up the stairs. At least, until Marcus shoved his chainsaw through one of the drones manning the troika machine guns.

Larcei used her shotgun to blast through another, before activating her cloak to slip into the Locust ranks and wreak havoc from within.

Jaden leaped down and attacked the Locust head on - his shields tanking the damage the bullets would've caused, before grabbing the first Locust to charge at him and snapped his neck. He then used his body as a meat shield as he proceeded to use its own rifle to gun down the Locust forces.

"Clear the streets! We need to clear the area for the Ravens; that means no Locust on the ground and no nemacyst in the air!"

Marcus and Dom manned the two troikas, spooling up and opening fire on inky blobs in the sky. "Alpha, this is Delta: we are near your position!"

" _We would like your AMMO at our position!_ "

"We're working on it, so hold tight!"

A drone screamed as Marcus gunned it down. "Looks dead enough to me."

Meanwhile, Larcei decided to see how well her Fusion Blade fared against the Locust, and came out of cloak to stab a Grub from behind.

The weapon went right through, the drone groaning before it died. It was joined by dozens of its' fellows. "All clear!"

"That was satisfying."

"Damn right. Nothing like killing a bunch of grubs in an afternoon." Delta Squad left the roof, leaving the Starfleet team on the roof.

"So, what do you think we're going to do after this? I mean, it's not like we're actually going to be able to do anything for them."

"I don't know," Larcei replied. "Ron's going to need to meet their government, discuss some kind of trade - we need resources if we're going to build those colony ships, after all."

On the ground, Alpha Squad walked out of the Tomb. "Who loves ya, baby?!"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, group hug." A man wearing goggles looked around, trying to find someone. "Where's Rojas?"

Cole sighed, pulling out a set of what looked to be gear-shaped dog tags, causing the blond-haired man to groan, before looking at the newcomers. "Alright, but who the hell are they?"

"Starfleet," Cole said. "Kept saying shit about them being from space, I don't care but they mak'n mincemeat out of those ugly grubs!"

"Saw some of that," Baird said, glancing at Jaden. "Were those fucking _lasers_ they were shooting?"

The sound of a counter-rotational helicopter approached, bearing the markings of the Coalition of Ordered Governments.

"Wow, talk about ancient," Larcei remarked. "They still use rotor-based aircraft here."

"Don't you have a Kamov Ka-50 on board the Ra Cailum?"

"Which my father is NEVER allowed to fly."

The King Raven came in, almost like shuttles from the Ra Cailum. Fitting, as CR helicopters had better control rivaling that of an AG craft.

At the expense of higher maintenance, which was why they were completely retired over four centuries ago.

Of course, that was when Murphy decided to throw a wrench into everything by having more Locust show up.

A nemecyst slammed into the KR, sending it crashing down.

"TAKE COVER!"

The Raven crashed, separating Delta from its' commander. "Fall in!"

Marcus shook his head, trying to get the ringing out of his ears. That was when a massive drone walked toward Minh from behind. Marcus knew this one.

General RAAM, leader of the Locust armies since Karn was killed by Kilo Squad.

Mobius 1 and 2 flew overhead at that point, opening fire on the Locust Hordes and throwing them off-balance.

RAAM roared as he was denied his kill, but he threw the short sword at Minh, shoving it through one of his lungs as he staggered back to his squad. Marcus reloaded his Lancer, ready to fight.

"No! We're here for Alpha and the resonator!"

Marcus nodded, growling as he knew Dom was right, as the group fell back into the tomb, firing on the Locust to keep them at bay.

Dom and Marcus shut the doors, Jaden barring them before pulling out a biofoam container and shoving it into Minh's chest. "This'll keep him alive. But unless we got another way out… we're screwed."

* * *

 **117Jorn: All around me are familiar faces, worn out places, worn out faces…**

 **Ron the True Fan: The Locust. I do not want to count how many drones we had to kill in the last two notes. I just know there were a LOT of them.**

 **117Jorn: I feel as if we've got a lot more- *loud roar in the background* SHIT! BRUMAK!**

 **Takeshi Yamato: FRAK!**

 **Ron the True Fan: Here we go, boys! Lock and load!**

 **Ja Ne!**


	26. Chapter 26

**Time/Date: 14 years after Emergence Day**

 **Location: Ephyra, Tomb of the Unknowns**

* * *

"We REALLY need to get out of here."

Jaden was forced to agree. " _Ra Cailum_ , this is Jaden: can you beam us out of here?"

"That'd be a no. something's screwing with the lock on your biosignatures, and I'd rather not risk it, personally. You'll need to get out in the open. Pinkerton out."

"Wonderful," Larcei remarked dryly. "Well, any ideas?"

"Well, we can't stay around here!" Marcus looked at the goggles-wearing Alpha Squad member. "You're Baird?"

"Yeah, I am; What's it to you, asshole?"

Before Marcus could respond, suddenly there was an earth shattering scream, causing everyone to stand up straight. "Quiet!" Baird hissed. "Don't. Move."

"The _fuck_ was _that_?" Jaden hissed, pulling out his rifle again.

"It's a Berserker," Baird replied. "She can hear us… she can _smell_ us…"

"Oh man," One of the Gears soldiers started to panic, "We gotta get out of here, we gotta get fucking out of here, man!" The soldier ran forward around a corner before Marcus could stop him… before the Berserker got him, and the images the shadows showed off was all they needed to know.

"Ok, we need to be VERY quiet."

"What we need is the Hammer." Marcus put his finger to his earpiece. "Anya, this is Delta: we have a Berserker in the area. Is the Hammer of Dawn still online?"

" _Yes, but your window is closing. Fast. Get outside and get outside quickly!_ "

"So… what's a hammer of dawn?" Jaden whispered as they creeped away. "And how will it kill it?"

"Seriously? You don't know about the Hammer?"

"Pretend I don't."

Dom gestured to Marcus. "His father designed it. It's a laser satellite network: as long as they're overhead, you can blast anything to nothing. Comes in handy."

It sounded a lot like the phasers used by the Starfleet people, only bulkier.

A screech forced them to dodge as the Berserker entered a larger chamber. It was completely naked, blind and covered in seemingly bulletproof skin.

"…and here I thought the Berserkers XCOM dealt with were ugly… " Jaden muttered.

The Berserker's head perked up, looking right at him.

"…oh Fuckberries…"

The being rushed at them, screaming like a banshee before the three rolled out of the way, the Berserker slamming into a series of decorative columns. "Door's sealed shut. Might as well use the bitch for something." Dom pulled out his handgun, tiptoeing in front of the door before firing the weapon, getting her attention. Like a quarterback with tunnel vision, she ran right at him.

Dom ducked and rolled out of the way, as the Berserker rammed into the door - busting right through it.

"If it works, RUN!" Jaden shouted, as the group charged out of the room before the Berserker got back to its feet. "That hammer better do what you say it does, Private!"

The Berserker stopped briefly before turning back at them, the blindness working in the humans' favor as it missed Marcus by inches.

"Next room. Sidearms only; this thing's completely bulletproof." Jaden was having trouble with the silence: even lightened with Starfleet engineering techniques, the MJOLNIR wasn't designed to be stealthy. "Starting to wish Pinkerton was down here; he'll kill that thing with his bare hands."

"Come on, man. Nothing can kill a Berserker except maybe a flamethrower and the Hammer."

"Uncle Ron's pretty tough," Larcei commented. "Not only is he naturally tough, but he got captured by a cybernetic hive-mind and… absorbed into it. He's free of them now, but the cybernetics couldn't be removed - they make him even tougher."

Neither Gear believed her. But it did attract the attentions of the Berserker, which ran at the door once again.

Larcei rolled out of the way, revealing one final chamber. "Screw this. A phaser at setting eight should punch through that thing's hide."

"I'd rather not risk your life on that, Larcei!" Jaden said, before ducking as the Berserker swung at him. "Oh fuck this!" The Berserker tried to punch Jaden again, however the SPARTAN jumped over the creature, before kicking it in the back - his augments and the power of the armor proving to be enough for to at least send the Berserker falling to the ground for a few moments. "Lily! Door! Now!"

"Right!" Lily nodded, as ROV-R moved towards the door - using its built-in laser cutter to slice off the locks to the door. The former XCOM engineer then kicked the door open.

THe Berserker reacted to the sound of the door falling, Lily jumping out of the Berserker's way before Marcus pulled out a bulky laser designator. "Marcus, drop the Hammer!"

The red beam impacted the Berserker, which didn't see its' death coming as the beam of light impacted the Locust female, burning through the skin in seconds.

"Ra Cailum _to away team; one of the satellites just fired dangerously close to your position! Respond!_ "

"Larcei to _Ra Cailum_ ," Larcei said. "Had a Berserker - not the type we know, but it's what the locals call it - show up, and according to them that satellite, the 'Hammer of Dawn', was the only way to kill it."

"Next time, use a phaser."

"We considered that, Uncle, but the Hammer was faster."

Marcus tapped his earpiece. "Control this is Delta. We're clear; Berserker's dead."

" _Copy that, Delta, I'm patching in Colonel Hoffman now._ "

"I take it Colonel Hoffman is your superior?" Larcei asked.

"Yeah." the COG comm popped.

" _Report._ "

"We've got what's left of Alpha and the resonator. Minh's badly wounded, though."

" _Hmm. Standby._ "

Dom looked at the skies. "We'd better get moving. It's going to get dark soon."

"Agreed," Larcei remarked. "We'll need to either set up a camp somewhere or find someplace with actual beds."

"You really aren't from around here if you didn't get what I meant." Dom shook his head. Larcei blinked in confusion, but before she could respond the radio spoke up again.

" _Delta, new orders. You're to deploy your resonator at the Lethia Imulsion facility._ "

"Shit never ends," Marcus muttered. "We're clear for Ravens."

" _Negative: Locust presence is too hot for our birds to land safety. You'll need to get there on foot. And you're in charge, Sergeant Fenix, as of now._ "

"…roger that," Marcus groaned. "We're moving. Delta out."

"Typical," Baird muttered, "Don't give the smart guy the promotion. No, no. Give it to the _jackass_ instead."

"So, we gonna haul ass to the factory, or what?"

Jaden shook his head. "Nope. I got a better plan. _Ra Cailum_ , do you read?"

"Ra Cailum _Shipwide Morgue: you stab em, we slab em. What can I do for you, Spartan?_ "

"…I'm not gonna ask. Just send down a couple of Warthogs. Shielded, preferably."

" _Two warthogs, a fuckton of ammo and two 'pods, coming right up._ "

"What the hell are-" Baird began… before a pair of four-wheeled vehicles appeared from out of thin air along with crates of supplies. "WHAT THE FUCK?!"

THUD! THUD! A pair of heavily armored walkers marched into the square, Jaden moderately annoyed by the Ronopods. "I just asked for the Warthogs."

"You need more firepower than the 'hogs can provide. My niece is down there with you; deal with it."

"I'm not complaining, I'm just saying they're—"

"HOLY SHIT!"

"A little much."

The two Ronopods stilled, awaiting commands from Jaden and the away team.

"Awww fuck YEAH!" Cole shouted, pumping a fist up, "We've got motherfucking walking tanks now bitches! The cole train's back on track!"

"Where the hell—"

"You do NOT want to know how we got those things. Just get in the damn jeeps."

* * *

The Locust, in spite of their use of Berserkers as the shock troopers from hell, were actually matriarchal: they answered to a queen.

And this queen was rather… human looking. The bitch in question was Queen Myrrah, an unknowing descendant of human researchers that studied the ancestors of the Locust.

"Hmm. Interesting. Humans with technology like this are a threat to our plans for the surface." Two of the queen's Kantus escorts stayed behind her, maintaining a respectful distance.

"Send whomever you can spare to intercept them." She ordered, "I want the strangers alive… one of them, at least."

A Theron Guardsman bowed to the queen, hissing in acknowledgement as it turned to leave - several other Therons standing as they moved to follow.

* * *

"So… when did Gears have THOSE?" Franklin said, pointing up at the towering Ronopods which stood at the entrance to the Stranded outpost.

"We don't." Marcus pointed towards the sky. "Someone upstairs decided to send us some help."

Franklin laughed. "God himself sent those things? Fuck me."

Dom groaned. "There's a fucking spaceship in orbit. They got guns that look like mini-Hammers of Dawn, and one of them took a Lancer to his armor and shrugged it off!"

Marcus was tempted to take his Lancer and shove it up Franklin's ass. Sure, the Hammer strikes were… extreme, but when you don't know how to deal with an enemy, extreme's all you've got.

"I ain't gonna bother, Santiago. I know you, but I don't know these guys. And I ain't doing THEM any favors."

Jaden glanced around the Stranded outpost, sighing as he activated his communicator "Jaden to _Ra Cailum_ , could you beam down someone with a decent amount of medical supplies, food, and such on our location?" He asked.

" _One moment._ " Crates began materializing, scaring the shit out of the Stranded before a single tower of light appeared, depositing Jaden's nominal commanding officer near the supplies, trademark compression rifle in hand. "Surprise, motherfuckers."

The Spartan blinked. "Uh… Why did you beam down?"

"One, boredom," he said. "I can only sign so many PADDs before I have to get up and shove a pike up something's ass, and two, I want to see what you're up against. It's kinda my thing: see what the hell my people are fighting, throw myself at it and see which one of us wins. Usually, it's me."

"What the fuck?!" Franklin shouted, pointing at Ron, and then at the supplies, before back at Ron again "How-wha-who-THE FUCK?!"

"Quantum teleportation, it's above YOUR head, I just came down here with supplies you need and I'm Captain Ronald Pinkerton of the United Federation of Planets Starship Ra Cailum. Now that I've answered your questions in the order of your asking, shall we get these supplies distributed, or do I have to kill someone first?"

Franklin wanted to argue, but… firstly, this looked like a man he did _NOT_ want to fuck with. And second: they just gave them practically gift wrapped supplies they've been needing for a LOOONG time, and he wasn't stupid enough to refuse. "Fuck it… fine. I… I need a fuck'n drink…"

"I have something very strong if you need it."

The sky then started getting dark. "Shit, the Kryll are comin' out soon."

"Krill? Like the shellfish?"

"I fucking wish…" Franklin shouted, before letting out a whistle. "Get those lights on people! Night time's coming unless you wanna be Kryll chow!"

The Stranded responded _very_ quickly, as any floodlight, ceiling light, and flashlight was snapped on as the skies continued to grow dark.

"I've got a bad feeling about this…" Lily muttered.

Jaden chuckled dryly "Took the words right out of my mouth."

Suddenly they heard the sounds of things flying overhead. Many things. And they were HUNGRY.

Ron walked up to the barricade and extended his arm into the black.

"Whoa, man, the fuck are you—"

"Trust me, the man is IMPOSSIBLE to kill." Jaden said. The things began hitting his shields, trying to tear his limb to pieces.

"Hmm. I'm considering keeping a few as pets," Ron mused, pulling his arm back. The Gears and Stranded stared at the captain.

"The fuck. You stuck-you stuck your HAND into a kryll swarm! And you're FINE?!"

"Personal shield generator. I can go fifty rounds with a gorilla and win without them. With them, there are few things that can hurt me."

Dom just nodded. "Well, we're not so screwed after all."

"I'll retool your shields to put out a UV pulse," Ron said. "Should kill them if they get close. Just remember to take cover: you won't be bulletproof anymore if I do this."

The Gears all looked at one another, before shrugging "Shit man, we've been fighting Locust without shields for ages," Dom said. "If it keeps us from turning into Kryll-chow, do it."

Ron twitched his head for a second. "Sorry, had to pull up the specs."

Baird raised an eyebrow. "Pull them up?"

"I'm a cyborg: 70% machine."

"DAMN! And I thought I was a machine! The train's got nothing on you, man!"

The captain pulled out his tricorder and began making remote modifications to the shields worn by his away team. "Stick to the vehicles, keep the locals within arm's length: UV range is 8 meters. Outside it, you will die. I'll stay here and try to get those things domesticated."

Sad part was, they believed he could do it.

"Well, let's get going," Larcei remarked.

The team reboarded their vehicles, Ron departing the camp to walk into the Kryll swarm. "Fucking crazy, man."

"Hey, he stuck his arm into that swarm. I think he'll be fine."

"Let's rock and roll people!" Jaden said, stepping behind the wheel. "Ain't no rest for the wicked!"

"You sure you can Driiiiiaiaaaaahhhh!" Larcei and Lily shouted as Jaden floored it as the Warthog sped forward. "WHY GO THIS FAST?!"

"This is how your _suppose_ to drive a Hog!" Jaden laughed, as he drove the LRV up a small ramp, gaining a bit of airtime. "Fuck I missed driving these things!" He blinked. "Oops, forgot my music!" He pulled out a small data disc, before sliding it into the radio of the Hog. Moments later…

 **BGM: Polkas y Huapangos - Los Dos Laredos (Otherwise known as the RvB Warthog theme)**

"Spanish polka music?!"

"When it fits!" And it did. It fit SO well...

"Turn that shit off!"

Well, most people liked it. Marcus and the Gears did not like it.

"Oi! When _you_ learn how to drive one of these things, THEN you can pick the fucking music!" Jaden shouted back.

"Come on," Dom said, looking from the back seat. "It can't be-" he looked at the controls, and blinked. "Wait… why are there six pedals when there are only four directions?"

* * *

In orbit, the Ra Cailum continued to track the course of the two 'hogs. And Takeshi was getting antsy. "Take, sit the hell down. I can't exactly afford to recarpet the bridge, and you're starting to wear a line in the deck."

"Usually Ron is up here. I'm good at running a ship with 50 people on board, not a superdreadnought with over 3000 people on board."

"Could be worse."

"Don't say it, Luna," Takeshi told her. "You know Murphy as well as I do, and what happens when you tempt him."

"We usually let Ron deal with Murphy."

"He's down there." The swordsman finally had enough. "I'm going down there."

"Takeshi, you KNOW the rules. Besides, you have no idea what's down there beyond 'it's hostile and everything wants to kill you'."

Takeshi scowled. Unless absolutely necessary, either the captain or first officer had to remain on board.

If anything, Ron knew Takeshi couldn't run the _Ra Cailum_ : all the micromanaging would drive him INSANE in a day.

Takeshi sighed. "Going to need to see if I can find another candidate for the XO position, so I can move to the _Firestorm_ full-time, and have less restrictions on going on missions."

"On this ship? No one wants the job!"

"I suspect Ron knew that. Get the away team on the horn."

Cassie and Corpsa shared a look before the AI opened a channel. "Spartan Takeo, this is Ra Cailum. The acting captain wants a status report."

The channel opened, and the bridge crew winced as they heard a loud acordion music in the background, followed by a shotgun blast " _YEAH, HOW'S THAT BUMPER TASTE, ASSHOLE!_ " A voice shouted, before there was a short cough. " _Ahem, yeah, this is Takeo. We're currently heading towards an Imulsion refinery plant - we're helping the Gears deliver some weapon called a resonator to hit the Locust in the hollows. We're about to enter the woods._ "

"Resonator?"

" _Some kind of sonic device. Sound waves can be lethal._ "

"Only at close range, Lieutenant: it's likely it's more like a mapping device."

" _Oh, that sucks! Why can't that thing just shake the ground apart?!_ "

"Because it doesn't work that way if it's man-portable."

" _Either way, the Gears are ordered by their command to do this, so we're just gonna help them survive._ " Jaden said.

"I've got a lock on a strong radio signal, Commander. I can beam you to their command center if I wanted to."

"No, contact Ron; I'll leave this in his… capable hands. What about your team, Jaden? Any injuries?"

"Uh… not exactly." Jaden said, "A few bruised egos, and Larcei's spooked because the Kryll - creepy as all hell flying things - are a few feet from the jeeps."

" _We saw them tear some Locust that stepped into the shadows into mincemeat,_ " Lily added on the comm. " _That shit… geez…_ "

Takeshi knew his daughter may have been unnerved, but Jaden's voice had more… concern in it than it had a right to. Sure Larcei considered her like a brother, and vice versa, but… He was going to need to head down there soon, maybe use his Psionics to find out just what was going on there.

"Screw the rules." He muttered, "Find out where those Warthogs are going."

"Aye, sir. Captain Pinkerton's requesting a site-to-site transport to beam into the populated city. Should I wait until you've gone down, or the other way around?"

"I'll wait until he's gone down," Takeshi replied. "He's probably going to try and speak to their leadership, and that's a bit of a priority."

"Aye, sir."

* * *

 **Jacinto, Tyrus**

* * *

"Colonel, do we have anything further on the people giving aid to Delta Squad?"

Colonel Victor Hoffman looked at Chairman Prescot, his technical superior. "Sorry, sir, I've got nothing, except for the fact they're highly trained, packing some serious guns and the Kryll are pissin' off from them."

Prescot hummed in thought. "Could the report be true… " he muttered. "Could they be from space?"

"Big place space is," Hoffman shrugged. "Hell if they kill Locust, they're friends of ours."

"The last thing we need is another threat." Prescot said, "I want to speak with whoever is leading these people."

A shower of light appeared in the command center, less then a meter from Anya Shroud's post, causing her to jump as man deposited by the shower of light sighed loudly. "If running were less of a pain in the ass, I'd've walked here. Surprise, motherfuckers."

Both men stared at the newcomer, who seemed to scream 'bored out of my mind'. There was also an aura of… death around the man. If anything ran into him and tried to kill him, he would win any fight. "So, who's in charge here?"

Hoffman was about to order security, but Prescot raised his hand. "That would be me," he informed, stepping towards the man. "Chairman Richard Prescott, of the Coalition of Ordered Governments. And you…?"

"Captain Ronald Pinkerton, captain of the USS Ra Cailum, representing the United Federation of Planets." He nodded, "Gotta say, Chairman, nice place you got here. I presume you glassed yourselves?"

Prescot rightfully winced. "We… didn't have much choice. Our enemy—"

"I have the basic details from Delta Squad, Chairman. I just want you to know that you're kinda fucked. You're losing this war of yours."

"You're not telling us anything we don't already know, Captain."

Ron was taken aback. "Huh. I expected denial. Usually people hate it when I say they're losing."

"This is our last chance to turn the tide, sir," Hoffman said. "If we fail, humanity dies."

"I… FUCK, my morals are going to screw over my crew one of these days," he muttered. "I might have a solution. I'm just going to need some help making it."

The leaders all looked at one another, before looking back at Ron. "Building… what?" Prescott asked.

"One of my allies has designs for a colony ship." Ron answered, "I can build as many as you need to evacuate from this planet."

"Are you saying we're to abandon Sera?!" Hoffman shouted, "We've fought 15 years against these inhuman bastards—"

"You are LOSING THIS WAR, Chairman. Sir, with all due respect, it's time you considered other options. My people can help you hold the line until the ships are completed, but it's time to face the facts."

Prescott sighed, closing his eyes for a moment, seeming to be deep in thought. "…how long would it take?" He asked, "These colony ships… how long would it take to build enough to house all the people of Sera?"

"Prescott-"

" _Colonel_ ," The chairman spoke before Hoffman could begin his protest. "The Captain is right… we are losing this war… for all these years, we fought the Locust believing we had no other choice… we had to fight to survive. But now we finally have a new option… we may lose Sera… but the planet isn't what's important. It's the people."

"A while. Three years at least. I can provide most of the resources, but I'll need a lot of manpower for the shit my shuttlecraft can't move into position."

"Three years? Captain, you just said this is our last chance; if this fails—"

"Then you'll be screwed and my option's still the only one open to you. I just need anyone willing to pick up a wrench. I don't care who they are." The COG chairman and Colonel thought about it. The man was asking them to abandon their homes.

But they were backed against a wall, and this was their last chance. "Captain, we'll accept your offer, with a request."

"Name it."

"Help us with this operation, help us fight the Locust. Give us the time we need to build your ships."

Ron shrugged. "Done. Now, mind if I jump on the comms?"

Prescott nodded, glancing at Anya who picked up one of the headsets at her workstation, tossing it over to Ron, who grabbed it.

"Pinkerton to Delta Squad: surprise, motherfuckers. I'm BAAAAAAAAAACK."

" _How the fuck did he hack into our comm channels?! Control, are you reading this shit?!_ "

Ron scoffed. "I'm at your command center, Baird," he said. "I'll provide tactical support from here, as well as serve as a relay between you and the Ra Cailum."

" _I-fine, whatever._ " Marcus said, " _We've almost reached the facility - Kryll are starting to piss off now that we're in the woods and out of the city. We'll keep you-_ " Marcus growled - as Ron noticed the background music " _WILL YOU SHUT THAT SHIT OFF!?_ "

" _It's the classics!_ " Ron heard Jaden retort, " _Perfect driving music right here!_ "

"Jaden!"

" _Oh, fuck. Yes, Captain?_ "

"Turn that shit UP!"

" _Don't you dare, you son of a—_ " Ron grinned as the music came in over the airwaves at full volume. " _PINKERTON, I'M GONNA KICK YOUR ASS FOR THIS!_ "

"I tanked Kryll. I even managed to knock a couple of them out. What can you do to top that?"

" _I'LL FIGURE SOMETHING OUT YOU-_ " Marcus's voice was droned out as the music increased, and Ron grinned.

"People have been trying for a long time. I'm still here."

The three people in the room glanced at one another. "You… don't seem to have many scars from those attempts."

"Trust me, I've been thrown some nasty shit."

"I'll… take your word for it," Prescott replied.

"Shoot me."

"What?"

"Put a gun to my head and pull the trigger. I'll be fine. And because I'm asking, you're exempt from my usual 'try to kill me, I kill you the fuck back' rule."

They all looked at him as if he was crazy.

Hoffman reluctantly pulled out his snub pistol and took aim at Ron's head.

* * *

A bang was heard over the comms, and Larcei began to panic. "What happened?!"

" _Relax, Larcei, I was just proving a point._ "

Takeshi's sigh could be heard over the comms. " _Ron… you are one crazy asshole,_ " he said.

"Proving a point?"

" _He probably asked someone to shoot him. And lo and behold, he's not dead._ "

"He's fuckin' crazy."

"Old news to the crew of his ship." Jaden said, "That's why no one leaves: they're all as crazy as him."

The Warthogs came up to a set of iron gates, as they slid to a halt - Jaden finally turning the music off (much to the Gear's pleasure) as they dismounted. "I'm guessing this is the place?"

"Yup. We get underground, plant that thing and get the fuck out. After that, we kick the fucking grubs in the teeth with a lightmass bomb. War's over, we win!"

"I doubt it's going to be that easy, Dom. It never is." A flash of lightning was seen overhead, and the Gears watched as a few Wretches ran across a rooftop. "The fuck was that?"

"Looks like those wretches…" Jaden muttered, "But they looked… weird…" He turned to the gate, as he pulled out his phaser pistol. "Give me a moment here, let's get this gate open." He put the phaser on a low setting, before he easily cut open a hole in the gate, large enough to allow all of them through.

"Control, this is Delta. We spotted glowing Wretches."

" _Yeah, your reports say lambent ones pop up near imulsion._ " Ron paused. " _…I'm going to patch in my ship's doctor._ " Marcus was beginning to really dislike Ron.

Blase attitude, worse than Baird when it came to being an asshole, and he was keeping Anya off the air.

" _This is Doctor Rutia Yulanra on board the_ Ra Cailum. _You morons reading me?_ "

Jaden chuckled. "We read you, Ma'am." He said, "Yeah, we've got glowing versions of those… Wretches the Gears call them."

"They're Lambent," Dom informed. "Locust exposed to Imulsion turn into them… and they tend to explode because of it."

" _DAMN IT! The one time I get to kill things that explode on their own and I'm stuck here!_ "

" _Calm your shit, captain. You'll get to shoot exploding things soon enough._ "

On second thought, Marcus' opinion of the captain was veering away from dislike to neutral. He wanted to face the exploding locust by himself.

" _If you can, make sure you get one of those things in more or less one piece. I want to take it apart._ "

And the doctor was just as fucking nuts.

"Right. Let's split up. Cole, Baird, you take one way. Dom and I'll take another. Split up your team the same way, people: we need equal firepower here."

"Aw man, I don't know man," Cole shook his head. "That sounds like a bad idea."

Marcus glared at him "I'll be sure to take that under advisement, Cole." He said. "Now, move it."

Cole rolled his eyes "Yes, Sir!" He said, saluting sarcastically before he and Baird left.

"Damn, Marcus…"

"He'll get over it." He said, as he and Dom went another way.

* * *

The ground opened up as a tall, lanky Locust and several other drones emerged from a hole.

The kantus growled as he searched the area outside for the new human threat. These weren't the Gears they were used to. They were better equipped. One even walked into a Kryll swarm and came out fine.

"Serve the Queen!"

They had humans to kill.

* * *

Marcus forced open a pair of sliding doors, Jaden and Larcei covering his back. "So, you two actually work for that asshole, Pinkerton?"

"Yeah… well, it's complicated." Jaden answered, "I'm actually from a different universe from Ron's, where I served the United Nations Space Command, or UNSC. Since I'm no longer there, I work for Starfleet, at least until we can finally return to my universe, from there… well, I'll think of something. "

"Huh." He picked up his Lancer again and walked into the dark room. Inside was an old TV, a couch…

BANG!

And an idiot with a shotgun who just fired it. "CEASE FIRE!"

The Stranded dropped the Gnasher, the smoking shotgun dropping to the floor. "Dipshit." "Finally! The rescue team! I was getting worried that I'd—"

"Die here? Still might. We're looking for the cart control room. Where is it?"

The Stranded blinked, looking at the soldiers, "Well… uh, you'd have to get down to the factory floor, through that door." He pointed towards the other door in the room. "But… it's locked."

"Can you help us unlock it?" Jaden asked. "We'll make sure you get out of here in one piece, mister, but we have another mission we need to do that's just as important."

"We aren't leaving?"

"Not yet." Marcus shook his head."Come on."

The Stranded man picked up his shotgun, Marcus shaking his head. "Dipshit."

"Screw you, you facist bastard!" The Stranded muttered, "We haven't forgotten the Hammer strikes, you know!"

"I didn't exactly have a say in doin' that, bub."

"You still left people to die when those lasers fired off! You killed a lot of people!" A feral scream caught their universal attention. "THe fuck was that?!"

"That…" Marcus checked his ammo count. 60 bullets, full mag. "Would be the Locust welcoming party."

"Just stay behind us," Jaden said, pushing the Stranded behind them. "Stay in cover, let us handle this."

"You're… not Gears?" he asked, looking at his and Larcei's uniforms.

"Long story, but no." Jaden informed, pulling out his own rifle. "For now, we're your best bet at getting out of this hellhole in one piece pal."

Bullets came at the Gears and their allies, fired from what looked like a machine pistol held by a tall and lanky Locust. "Ok, that's a new one."

"Kill it with bullets." Marcus popped his head out of cover, firing his lancer at the lightly armored locust, who decided to leave by running to a window and jumping out.

"The fuck was that thing?"

"Who cares? Let's just get the fuck out of here!"

"Don't worry," Jaden said, as the new Locust came back in from another window, charging at Jaden with its own Lancer primed-

BAM

-only for its head to go flying off as Jaden punched it with his armor's full strength. "We've dealt with worst freaks than him," he added, depolarizing his visor to show them his smirk.

Larcei sighed, shaking her head even as she smiled. "Showoff… "

* * *

The drones wanted nothing to do with that guy.

He punched off a Kantus' FACE. They wanted nothing to do with that shit.

So they'd let the Lambent deal with them. Simplier to let the exploding ones do the work.

* * *

Larcei was thankful for Rov-R and her tricorder, which allowed her and the Gears to stay on the support beams. Although the groaning metal when Jaden started his own walk. "Uh… how old is this place?"

"Been around long before the pendulum wars," Marcus answered, "Not exactly well maintained after the Hammer strikes 15 years ago… "

"Meh, I've seen older." Jaden said, walking over some wooden planks. "Back when I was in the UNSC I had-" suddenly the floor gave away, and Jaden dropped down, followed by a loud snarling sounds.

"Jaden!" Larcei shouted, rushing over to the edge, looking down for her lover in worry… not that she had much to worry about. The Lambent Wretches clawed and bit down against his armor… and doing almost nothing in terms of damage, not even scratching the paint.

"I swear, these things are more annoying than Grunts," Jaden muttered, grabbing one of the Wretches, and snapping its neck before stomping another one with his boot.

He was not expecting them to explode seconds later. "Ok, that's not fun." Jaden muttered, wiping off the blood. "I half expect those little furballs on the Ra Cailum to explode next!"

"He's working on it!"

Jaden did not doubt it. The crew of that ship were CRAZY.

But it was a crazy he could get behind. "I found a way up! I'll make my way to you!"

* * *

 **Jacinto**

* * *

Ron decided to have Adama and Drake beam down, as they would be needed for the discussions on the building of the new refugee ships. "Admiral, I know this is not what you were expecting—"

"Inhuman monsters are trying to kill the human race. Your fight with the Iconian bitch was weirder."

Ron thought about it before nodding. "Good point. Either way, we're going to need the Colonials help for this. They don't have helicopters to spare, and my shuttles lack the gentle touch your Raptors have."

"Say no more," Adama nodded. "Their situation with the Locust is too damn similar to ours against the Cylons - we'll pitch in where we're needed, Raptors _and_ Vipers - way I hear it, their own birds could use some escorts."

"Do it."

The doors opened to the command center, with Prescot and Hoffman conferring with their teams in the field. "Captain, your teams are at the facility and ready to deploy the resonator."

"A sonic device won't map their tunnels. You'd have to flood them out."

"That's not an option, Captain. The lightmass bomb is our last shot. And who are these gentlemen?"

Ron gestured to Drake. "Captain Adrian Drake, commander of the UNSC Saratoga and de facto commander of the UNSC forces in our fleet. The older gentleman is Fleet Admiral William Adama of the battlestar Galactica, who has offered his support with gunships and fighters. Just to keep the skies a little friendlier. They're all shielded, so don't worry about that."

"Hot damn," Hoffman chuckled, "It'll be nice to have some friendlies in the air again, haven't had a proper fighter squadron sortie in a long time."

"The Captain will be providing designs for the colony ships. They'll be modelled after the colony ship we have in orbit, with a few… modifications. While I'm sure you don't want to run—"

"We know when we're going to lose, Captain."

"Well. Either way, those ships will be aiding in our own escape from this universe." Ron informed, "Our FTL drive is overstressed, and the colony ships will help. I was planning on refitting some of the ships to help, but I'm killing a flock of birds with one rock. I save as many people as possible here and I get to keep my ship's warp nacelles from exploding."

"I cannot begin to thank you and your people enough, Captain Pinkerton." Prescott said, "We may lose Sera, but so long as the people survive, that's good enough for us."

"I'll have my engineers set up in an isolated area." He said, "Locust attacks would slow down construction."

Anya raised a hand from her post. "Colonel, Delta's detonated the resonator." She informed, "Data is coming in now!"

Ron approached the command post, shaking his head as the information came in. "Useless. Network's too large for a single sonic device to map. We might have to use my ship's sensor array to get you your targeting data."

"Hang on… " Anya said, pulling up a screen - showing the Geobot Baird recovered, "This Geobot is showing off much more data than the Resonator. "

"Do we have a zero point on that data?" Hoffman asked.

Anya looked through the coordinates "Sir, well… " she blinked. "It… came from the east barricade Academy… from his father's house, specifically."

"Whose Father?"

"...Sergeant Fenix, sir."

Hoffman put his finger to his earpiece. "Think you can still find your way home, Fenix?"

The Gear didn't respond. He didn't need to. "I'll contact the Ra Cailum; I'll have a team of MACOs in that location inside two minutes."

"You sure your people can handle East Barricade?"

"MACOs are the elite of the Starfleet Marine Corps. There are VERY few things that can withstand facing them. Hell, give them five minutes and every Locust within two kilometers will be a dead corpse."

"…I feel as though you're exaggerating, but if they can help clear the area, I won't say no," Hoffman said. "Fenix, Raven's en-route. Get ready to head home, Marcus."

* * *

Takeshi was not in the mood to carry anything short of his katana, but after his wife beat his head in, he reluctantly put on a PSG and had a modular phaser rifle in carbine form on his back.

He preferred the more honorable way of combat, it was how he'd been raised, after all, but after getting his ass handed to him enough times in actual free-style combat spars with that cheating bastard he called his captain, he had to adapt.

That said, he was currently on the ground with the MACO teams at East Barricade, his Plasma Katana chopping through Locust like butter - and he once again thanked Lily Shen for coming up with such an excellent weapon.

A pair of King Ravens entered the area, escorted by a pair of Colonial Vipers. "Viper 45 to Commander Yamato: trying to commit suicide down there?"

"I've got shields—"

"For once!"

"Oh, shut up. I'll be fine unless they've got something like the hammer of dawn." A loud scream signalled the arrival of a Locust Berserker, and as Takeshi wasn't exactly being silent, it was zeroing in on him.

He also didn't have Ron's augmentations, so he REALLY didn't want to get hit.

However, he had his Spatial Awareness, which, with the awakening of his Psionics, had increased to near-ridiculous levels, and his reaction time was greater than even Ron's.

As such, as the Berserker brought its fist down, Takeshi rolled out of the way, before slicing off one of its legs with his plasma blade.

The massive female drone screamed as it felt the loss of her leg, right before Takeshi shoved the blade through the Berserker's head. This wasn't the time to worry about honor; the Locust were going to kill them by any means possible.

Takeshi's thoughts on that were confirmed when a squad of Drones pointed their weapons at him. "Die, human!"

Of course, as they opened fire, another advantage of his enhanced Spatial Awareness and his reflexes made itself known, as he started using the blade to begin _swatting bullets out of the air_.

Of course, while he had that, he didn't have the added power of a positronic brain to calculate EXACTLY where the bullets would impact, so quite a few rounds impacted his shields.

And by few, read more than 80. Takeshi was spared further embarrassment, however, when the King Ravens finally arrived, firing their 15mm gatling sideguns at the Locust, tearing them apart as a man wearing a do-rag and a unique semi-powered armor stepped out of the craft. "You're fucking stupid, you know that?! I don't care if you got those fancy shields, you SHOOT the grubs, not stand around swinging some fancy sword!"

Takeshi sighed. "Everybody's a critic," he muttered under his breath, even as more Locust appeared from their E-Holes, Takeshi taking advantage of how preoccupied they were with climbing up to charge into their midst and begin slicing them to pieces.

Unfortunately, Takeshi was not precognition, and was taken off guard by a large explosion hitting his shields, knocking him to the ground.

"BOOM!" The massive drone that fired the shot calmly reloaded his weapon before a phaser beam decapitated it.

Takeshi shook his head before a hand extended itself down to him. He took it and his vision cleared, showing it to be Larcei. "I hate to agree with Uncle Ron, but you ARE being really dumb. You're putting yourself in far too much danger, and unlike your psychopathic brother in law, you don't have a head as hard as steel."

"Actually, it's harder than diamond."

"That's SEMANTICS. I'm not going to be the one to tell kaa-san that you were so focused on using that sword of yours that some idiot with a rifle or grenade launcher killed you."

Takeshi sighed. "Alright, fine…" he said, before deactivating and sheathing his sword and drawing the carbine from his back.

He hated guns. But he was starting to get the point.

Which started with Ron using a VERY accurate caricature of him charging at a bunch of Klingons before he stepped into a minefield, which promptly killed the caricature.

Takeshi had never forgiven him for the embarrassment he suffered that day.

* * *

In orbit, Corpsa was getting a LITTLE tired of the stupidity. "I could fire a single burst into that city and take out every Locust within half a kilometer. Damn it, our people are down there and the captain won't let us take the simple way out!"

"You know the rules, Corpsa: unless the captain gives the order, we're defending the fleet."

Corpsa groaned, leaning over the consoles looking at the controls angrily. "I know the rules, of of all the Captains in Starfleet, Ron would be the FIRST to take the more practical route… " she muttered.

Sonja was forced to agree. But Ron wasn't willing to cause damage to their objective unless the risk was acceptable. "Incoming transmission from the captain."

"About time. Put him up, audio only."

" _Sonja, weapons free. Our idiot XO nearly got himself killed playing samurai down there._ "

"I thought he knew that samurai in the face of modern weapons were useless."

" _He's a stubborn idiot, Sonja; you know that. Maybe that grenade to the side he took will teach him a lesson._ "

Corpsa smirked. "About fucking time!" she shouted, taking control of the Phasers. "Phasers armed and ready! Give me a target Captain!"

"Larcei and Jaden will provide target designation. Burn them to their constituent atoms."

* * *

"Clear the area! Get the hell to the manor, now!" Marcus glanced at Jaden before continuing to fire at the Locust. "Why?" "Remember the Hammer of Dawn? Think that, only about a hundred times worse, and it's coming down now!"

As the Hammer was able to kill Berserkers in seconds, that was bad. "Fuck me. Delta, fall back! Get to Fenix Manor and secure the area! The spaceship's got our backs!"

Jaden started running as well - but noticed Larcei and Lily were a bit slower. Sure he didn't doubt that they'd make it themselves… but he wasn't taking any chances, slowing down long enough to pick both of them up. Larcei 'eeped' slightly. "Jaden, wha-"

"Not taking any chances," He said, getting back to running at full speed. "Hang on you two!"

The drones decided to follow them, although much slower.

Their mistake.

The skies lit up as a beam of energy impacted the ground, enveloping the entire area behind the Gears. "HOLY SHIT!"

The dazed XO shook his head. The Ra Cailum just leveled 50 acres of land to deal with a small army of enemy troops. But that wasn't his real focus. Instead, that was on Jaden and the two women he was carrying.

He seemed to be a bit too concerned about their welfare. Takeshi decided it was as good a time as any, and reached out with his psionics. Delving too deeply would be noticed, but he could read surface thoughts at least.

' _Not taking AAAANNY chances,_ ' Takeshi heard Jaden think. ' _Not losing them, either… especially not now…_ '

' _He can carry both of us, and barely slow down?_ ' Lily thought. ' _Well, I guess that explains his stamina last night…_ '

Takeshi blinked. Last night? Stamina? That meant… well. Once they were done here, Jaden was likely going to be paying sickbay a visit. The girls, too, but for different reasons, given what he was getting from Larcei herself.

Well, this explained Ron's reaction to him dating Luna back when he was teaching at the Academy.

Granted, Take actually thought Ron was trying to KILL him, but that was a tale for another time.

Which he ignored in favor of the manor that was currently in ruins in front of him.

"This is your family home, Fenix?" Larcei asked with a low whistle. "Damn… pretty impressive."

"Yeah. Kinda fucked me over."

Takeshi didn't want to know. "Get inside, get the data, and then we leave."

"Since when do you give us orders?"

"Commissioned officer, and you know the house. As Ron would say, it makes sense. So get inside and get the data so we can get it to that bomb of yours."

Marcus grumbled, but nodded as he and Dom went deeper into the house to aquire the data.

"I doubt the Locust are just gonna go away even after that show of force," Jaden said, looking out a window. "We should probably get ready for company… "

" _Ground force,_ Galactica _Actual. I'm vectoring a pair of Raptors to provide air support. Don't get yourselves shot._ "

"That'll help."

"Two raptors? We'll need a lot more then that to clear the city."

Ron's voice cut in seconds later. " _One raptor will pick you up, the other will clear the LZ for you to get the hell to the bomb. Which is on a train, I might add. Now get that targeting data._ "

Jaden nodded "Roger that, we'll be ready," he said. "Just let us know when the Locust decide to show up again."

"That would be now. We're picking up major seismic activity, and it isn't natural, if you get my meaning."

"The shit never ends."

"Oh, it'll end. Ron might just lose his patience and unleash some kind of bio-weapon."

"Don't joke. He's got 30 torpedoes fit with nanotech that will kill ANYTHING he wants them to kill."

"Wait, he still has those?" Jaden asked Takeshi. "I would've thought he got rid of them after we took care of the Ethereals."

"Yeah, he still has them," Takeshi replied. "They may have originally been made to deal with those assholes, but Ron is nothing if not resourceful - if he makes something but doesn't use it, he keeps it around in case he runs into something to use it ON."

"The man's paranoid."

"He said something about something as bad as the Undine that he wants to kill off. I think he'll get his chance." Ron had mentioned seeing something in that Ethereal's head. And it came from Jaden's mind.

He called it genetic memories surfacing, and wanted to be ready for the flood, whatever he was talking about.

" _Control to assholes: prepare for additional weapons fire. Mwahahahahaha!_ "

A Raptor flew overhead - its weapon hardpoints now sponsoring Starfleet-grade Phasers among other weapons, before opening fire on the emergence holes before Locust could start pouring out. However it wasn't able to get them all at once, and multiple Locust still spilled out onto the surface, opening fire on the building.

Jaden returned fire - picking up a Lancer on the ground, deciding to give the Gear's weapons a test run of his own. A hail of armor-piercing bullets cut through the incoming Locust. The rifle had its fair share of kick, that was for sure - but it did twice as much damage against as his old MA37 did. And the chainsaw…

He heard a roar from below, as a Locust Theron Guardsman crashed through the door. Jaden leaped down, revving up the chainsaw, and slamming it against the neck of the Locust, blood shot out from the creature as Jaden cut the beast apart.

...oh he was going to LOVE this gun.

Takeshi grabbed his own Lancer from Dom, who was using his preferred Hammerburst. After pulling the trigger just once, he knew that Ron was going to LOVE this gun. The chainsaw was going to be a plus for him; it provided a melee option.

…Forget Ron; HE was going to love this thing! A bit bulky, but that was easily solved! Especially after Lily and Sonja got through with it and gave it what he was beginning to call the XCOM treatment - make more advanced versions that were basically the same just with more powerful equipment.

…Heck, he could just imagine it with a PLASMA chainsaw, just like his new katana! The thing could tear through anything short of Neutronium at that point, and maybe even that!

Another lance of nadion particle energy impacted the ground, vaporizing everything in front of the house. "Raptor 794, callsign Boomer, to ground forces: ETA on data download?"

"Delta to Raptor 794: data download is in progress! ETA two minutes!"

" _Make it sooner: we got something in the air! Big and tentacled, and I've seen enough porn to know where this is going_!"

"Ah shit, REAVERS!" Marcus shouted, and no sooner than he finished the statement, a loud roar echoed through the air as three of the creatures arrived at the battlefield, their gunners opening fire with their Troika's down at the building.

"Great, NOW I'm thinking of Rule 34! Thanks a lot, Boomer!"

" _Frak you, asshole!_ "

" _Baird, Boomer, just KILL THE FUCKING THINGS and get to the train. Mobius four and seven are en route now to give better air support. Don't die in the meantime. Pinkerton out._ "

"Time we get moving then!" Jaden shouted, opening fire at the Locust mounts. "Is that Data ready yet?!"

"Done! We've got it!"

"Then it's time to MOVE OUR ASSES!"

The Reavers landed before firing on the Gears, right before a pair of Peregrine-Class fighters lanced through their bodies using their forward phaser arrays. "Mobius 5 to ground team: enemy force is down. Get to the Raptor."

"No need to tell us twice!" Boomer's raptor set down briefly, just long enough for the hatch to open and the team to get aboard.

"Thank the gods for Henderson, or I'd never be able to take off with this load!"

"Get us to that train, Boomer!" The Cylon pilot closed the hatch before the Raptor took off, heading for the train station.

"Well, that was fun."

"Yeah, it was," Takeshi remarked. He then looked at Jaden, as well as Lily and Larcei. "Spartan, once we get to the ship, I'm going to want to… _spar_ with you."

Jaden blinked in confusion "Huh?" he asked. "Well… okay, I guess, but why?"

Takeshi _smiled_. "You should really learn to guard your surface thoughts more," he told him, even as he turned to Lily and Larcei and said, "And the same goes for you two on the thoughts department, though the two of you are going straight to sickbay to get checked over by Rutia when we get back."

Both Lily and Larcei paled slightly, realizing that Takeshi was on to them… Jaden, on the other hand… "Surface thoughts?" he asked. "I don't get it."

Larcei sighed. "He has _Psionics_ , Jaden-kun…" she muttered. "Do the math."

Jaden thought about it for a moment, psionics - involved telekinetic abilities, and can control and read… minds…

Oh.

OH.

 _OH._

 ** _OH._**

"…Ohhhhh…" Jaden was wishing _very_ hard he, Larcei and Lily could up and vanish from the face of the world right then and there.

"Don't worry, I won't kill you…" Takeshi said with a bit of a dark chuckle. "You'll most definitely need to see Rutia later, though…"

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: (Wilhelm Scream) HA! Fuckin' grubs. Well, that took a while, but we cleared them out. Oh, look. Just in time for the next posting. In case the readers are wondering, this particular chapter was finished on September 8th, 2016: _Star Trek The Original Series_ ' original air day. Happy 50th, _Trek_! (52, really, if you go by production and you count The Cage…)**

 **117Jorn: Hard to believe it's been 50 years already…**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Yeah… and about 30 since the debut of TNG, as well… still hard to believe I was born the same year that TNG started up…**

 **Ron the True Fan: It will go on, as long as people continue to watch it, and believe in its' message that we can be better then we are. Gene Roddenberry, you glorious bastard, I hope you're smiling wherever the hell you are, and I hope you're reading this! Enjoy the Odyssey!**

 **Ja Ne!**


	27. Chapter 27

**Time/Date: 14 years after Emergence Day**

 **Location: _Ra Cailum_ Sick bay**

* * *

"I didn't think… you'd punch back that hard…"

"You punched me in the dick."

"I was aiming for your gut!"

"You punched me. In. THE DICK!"

Larcei, Lily, and Luna all collectively sighed as they looked at bruised and battered conditions their respective spouses were in. Jaden sporting several cut marks, casts, and a rather large one covering his… below the belt area. Takeshi in a rather similar state.

"Tou-san…" Larcei groaned. "Was this… _really_ necessary?"

"Maybe, maybe not…" Takeshi remarked. "It felt good, though…" He sighed, then looked at Luna. "How did Rutia's tests go?"

Luna sighed… though she did smile ruefully. "Well… we're going to be grandparents before we hit our thirties…" she remarked, chuckling at the oddity. "And our next child is going to have nieces and/or nephews that are only a few months younger than he/she is."

"Temporal mechanics always make for massive headaches. Unless you're Ron. In which case, you're going to be the one with the headaches." Rutia smacked both of the idiots upside the head before handing Takeshi a PADD. "You'll be displeased to know that your daughter is pregnant." Jaden did a double-take at that info as Rutia continued, "I guess my modifications to that implant supercharged his sex drive. Of course, that's not the worst of it."

"What's the worst part?"

Rutia smirked. "The boss doesn't know just yet. And he dotes on Larcei. You're in DEEP shit, Spartan."

Jaden scoffed before actually thinking about it. Ron _broke his jaw_. His supposedly _unbreakable_ jaw.

And that was hand to hand. What would happen if he decided to use his kilij or phaser rifle?

"…welp, I'm dead." Jaden muttered, banging his head.

" _Pinkerton to Yamato._ " Jaden almost screamed in terror before his military training kicked in. All he had to do was avoid him for the next few days. After he calmed down, Jaden's life would no longer be in immediate jeopardy.

"Go ahead, Ron."

" _You sound like you got punched in the dick, Take. Something happen?_ "

Takeshi looked at Jaden, who was silently pleading with the XO to not tell Ron. But Takeshi had spent years around Ron, and his assholeness had rubbed off, if slightly.

"Well, I got into a fight with Jaden—"

" _Oh, you found out he slept with your daughter._ "

"You KNEW?"

" _I have near-constant access to the internal sensors: I accidently 'walked in' on them, so to speak, while they were in the middle of fucking each other's brains out - along with Lily._ "

Takeshi let out a rueful laugh. "Well, seems that your 'curse' extends beyond me and Luna, and even beyond physical doors," he remarked. "Anyway, it seems that, in addition to Luna's latest, you'll soon have grandnieces and/or grandnephews to dote on."

" _She's pregnant?_ "

Jaden silently screamed.

"They both are," Takeshi replied.

" _…I'll kill him later. I've got better things to do. We're organizing the new_ Phoenix _-class construction yards on an offshore facility: the Locust don't seem to want to touch the place, so it's good enough. Organize the engineering crews for the job and get on the horn for the Colonial mining ships. They're about to be very, VERY busy._ "

And now they were back on the clock.

"Understood, Ron," Takeshi replied. "Good luck down there."

Jaden started sobbing. He had dodged a bullet.

Barely.

"Don't worry," Luna remarked. "He won't kill you."

"Really?"

"Beat the living shit out of you, yes, but he won't leave our babies fatherless," Larcei agreed. "He might be a dick, but when it comes to family, he doesn't screw around."

Jaden figured that during the second XCOM incident.

"Doc, prep a biobed for him, just in case."

Rutia darkly cackled, deeply amused. "Already done!"

Yup, he was fucked.

* * *

"The colony ships will be modified: better living spaces, holodecks—"

Prescot looked at Ron when he mentioned the holodecks. "What?"

"Long story. Either way, the people won't go insane during our trip to our universe."

"That's a relief," Prescot said, "How many of these ships do you plan on building?"

"How many people are willing to leave?" Question answered with a question, but Prescot saw the point: maximum capacity dictated number of ships. "We have contact with a number of Stranded camps, most of whom will be willing to leave Sera once they know they have the option. The rest hate us for the Hammer strikes."

"I would too, but at least it's not radioactive," he said. "They survived. At least three ships are needed for us to get past warp 1.4, and each ship can carry up to one hundred and fifty thousand people. Six is my personal safety margin, but more is better."

"Build however many you believe we need, Captain," Prescott said. "Also, I believe you can begin construction at Port Farrall - it's been abandoned since the Hammer strikes. It's the best place I can think of that's out of the way enough to not worry too much about Locust strikes."

"Location, please."

Prescot looked to Anya, who quickly brought up the location of the base on a monitor. "I can send your ship the location if you want, Captain."

"No need. I've already done it."

"How the hell did you—"

"I'm a cyborg: 70% machine. I've got a neural transceiver in my upper spinal column, and I've been in direct contact with my ship for the past few minutes."

Hoffman stared disbelievingly at Ron. "Well, that explains your… incredible feats that Delta reported in."

"Speaking of which, you'll be pleased to know the _Ra Cailum_ 's picked up a LOT of secondary explosions underground. You shoved the spiky dildo up their asses, gentlemen. Congratulations."

Anya blanched a little at the crass comment.

"And lady. Gotta admit, Lieutenant, the COG's fucked up their day. Still, I'll provide whatever support I can outside our technology. We've got a rule in regards to that."

"You're helping us build colony ships."

"Well, I'm being a little selfish, too: I don't want my ship to explode the next time we leave. I'm just killing three birds with one well-thrown rock. I can't provide you with weapons, but the Colonials and UNSC can, and my crew is getting a little crazy in regards to not having things to shoot at."

This was what was referred to as enlightened self-interest: how he could help himself and others.

"As I've said before, any help is appreciated." Prescott nodded. "But either way… we've still got a long war ahead of us before we can finally be safe from the Locust."

"Alrighty, then." Ron extended his hand. "I suppose this is the part where you say 'welcome to the war'?"

Prescot laughed. He was an asshole.

But he was their kind of asshole. He was abrasive, but willing to help whoever wanted it, crude, but highly intelligent.

Prescot grabbed his hand. "Welcome to the war, Captain."

* * *

Delta Squad had been partly broken up: Minh and the former Alpha Squad boys were reassigned, leaving Dom and Marcus on the team before a pair of people in beige bulletproof armor carrying white rifles with a green glowy inside walked up to them. "Sergeant Fenix?"

"Yeah, that's me. The fuck are you?"

"Short fused, just like the Commander said. Jessica Orland, XCOM. This is Richard Smith. We've been asked to reinforce Delta on the orders of Captain Pinkerton. Figured he'd want to keep you guys in the fight."

Marcus sighed, but he wasn't going to say no to help. "Alright, glad to have you," he said. "Just make sure you carry your own weight."

"We can handle ourselves, Fenix. The Locust aren't the freakiest shit we've run into, though the Berserkers on your end seem a LOT nastier than ours."

"What, you fought Berserkers, lady?"

The XCOM Corporal smirked. "Yeah. Had to put a LOT of lead into them before they dropped. The plasma rifles came in handy after that."

Marcus knew what plasma was: the Hammer of Dawn was a plasma beam weapon, after all. "Handheld?"

"Oh, yeah. After a while, you have to vent the heat sinks, but it's got pretty much unlimited ammo."

"Nice," Marcus replied. Would be interesting to use a handheld version of the Hammer.

"Thought you'd say that." They handed the pair two similar pistols. "Plasma pistols. The ray gun from hell. Point, and anything human dies if you don't got good armor."

Oh, yeah. This was going to be a GLORIOUS relationship.

* * *

 **3 months after Lightmass Offensive - preparations for Operation: Hollowstorm**

* * *

Marcus had to admit it: those XCOM people were good. It was a shame they had to be reassigned, but that wasn't Pinkerton's choice: asshole he may have been, but he didn't break up winning combinations.

They kicked the shit out of the Locust, and the COG were getting ready to leave Sera, as almost every civilian was being evaced from Jacinto as he thought.

But the war wasn't over yet, as a Gear was wheeled past him on a gurney. "They're getting bolder: those Gears were defending Pomroy." Anya spoke.

"Damn," Dom muttered, "That's just down the block from here."

"Exactly," the Lieutenant said, "They're getting bolder every day." A King Raven flew overhead, landing on the street as Gears dropped out.

"At least we got reinforcements," Dom informed.

"Yeah, but for how much long?"

A trio of Vipers flew overhead, with a Raptor circling the hospital. Marcus had to admit, the new help were good.

"I'm going to head back to control; the Ra Cailum's probably got enough status reports that I'll be overloaded for a bit, plus I have to check on that lead."

Maria. Marcus knew Dom's wife, and wanted to see her returned safely to Dom's side.

"Sergeant Fenix?" Marcus' attention turned to a familiar voice. The voice of a Carmine. Anthony died thanks to a Longshot round to the head because he poked his head out of cover, and he wasn't in the mood to see another one die.

"I'm your new trainee!" He dropped his Lancer, causing him to fumble and he picked it up.

"And green as grass, from the looks. Time to train the rook?"

Marcus rose his brow "After the attacks on Pomroy?" He asked, "Hell no, I need to be out on patrol! Not training some jumpy kid!"

"Of course," Anya said, "I'll see you inside - and Dom? I'll keep you informed on that… lead."

Dom nodded. "Thanks, Anya, I… take care,"

Anya left the area, boarding one of the Colonial Raptors as Carmine approached. "Private Ben Carmine, sir, reporting for duty, sir!"

"Welcome to Jacinto, private. Your first assignment's to guard this spot." He didn't need to see the poor bastard die like his brother.

"But… there's nothing here, sir."

"Sounds like a hell of an assignment to me, rook." Cruel, maybe, but the hospital was safe, what with the XCOM gauss turrets tearing Drones and even causing Berserkers to bleed out and die.

The Lancers weren't upgraded with that sorta weaponry. Yet. Sonja said she was working on it for the COG's Gears while the Starfleet people got a better version.

So, yeah, the place was perfectly safe. "Come on, Dom. Let's go."

* * *

The moment they stepped inside the hospital, the entire building shook. "Shit… more of 'em… " Marcus muttered, as they passed through a door where several Gears soldiers were suiting up. One in particular Marcus and Dom recognized - a man with a mohawk and multiple tribal tattoos on his face and arms.

"Tai," Marcus nodded at the Gears soldier, "Good to see you - how's it looking?"

"Locust Raid, follow me." The Irohma Islander said, as the gears moved out.

"Grubs must have some serious balls to attack like this," Dom muttered.

"I do not believe it has anything to do about courage," Tai informed as they scaled the stairs. "More like they have no idea they were sent on a Suicide Run."

Suicide, indeed, with those gauss turrets. "Maybe they're just desperate."

"What do you mean?"

"Maybe the Lightmass bomb hit them harder then we thought." Marcus shruged "Or there's something going on in the hollow. I don't know."

The trio entered a care wing with a number of coughing people on cots. "Heads up, Delta. These people have rustlung." Marcus had heard about that: Imulsion sickness.

The stuff was nasty, and had been cropping up since the bombing.

"Okay, take position along these windows. I'll take the far side."

Marcus nodded, as the Gears took their positions - he noticed the ambush set up down below, several fuel canisters set up in the center of the room. "Wait till they all get into the room, then shoot the gas!" He called out, as the Locust began slamming against the doors.

The drones blew open the door, yelling at their fellows to attack the humans inside. But balls meant nothing against brains as Tai opened fire with his Lancer, hitting the canisters, causing a large explosion that acted much like a number of grenades going off.

"Let's mop these bastards up, Delta!"

"Viper 87 to KR-78: we've got Reavers incoming. I think these idiots don't get the message."

"Viper 87, KR-78: Agreed. Why don't we send them packing, Kat?"

Marcus groaned as the Colonial fighter flew over the hospital, phaser cannons audible even through the multiple floors. "Fucking Viper jockeys."

"At least they keep the air clear of the nemacyst," Tai said. "Their leader is crude, but a man of honor in his own way."

"Hey, having some hypersonic air support is a blessing nowadays," Dom said. "As long as they make the Locust's days hell, I'm game!"

The lights suddenly went out, causing the Gears to be bathed in darkness. "Great, now we got a power outage."

"Let us look on the bright side. At least the Locust blood looks nice in this light."

"You are VERY screwed up, Tai."

* * *

At least the Locust weren't getting very far thanks to those gauss turrets that ADVENT designed, but Lily and Sonja perfected. A short burst from the 10mm shaved rounds turned Locust into ground, burning meat. Even the Berserkers were slaughtered by them. Their only real weakness was air attack, as Ben Carmine was about to learn.

"REAVER!" A Gears shouted, as a Locust Reaver mount landed on top of one of the turrets - incapable of raising its gun upwards fast enough as the Locust riding it fired its Troika into the turret, blasting it apart.

Carmine fired his Lancer up at the Reaver, or at least the pilot - his aim hitting true as the Locust riding the beast fell off missing a head. He pulled the trigger again, but no bullets came out. "Fuck, Cover me!" He shouted, as he ducked back into the hospital doors, closing them behind. He took a moment to catch a breather, panting in exhaustion. ' _Guess this is what it's like serving with Delta…_ ' he thought.

"The hell you doing here, Rook?" Carmine jumped slightly, as Marcus came in from the pair of double doors ahead of him, along with Dom and Tai.

"T-The area I was guarding got too hot, Sergeant," he answered quickly. "These gears rallied me up and started fighting, Sir."

"So WHY aren't you out there, fighting?" Marcus growled.

"R-Reloading sir," He said, as he ejected the spent ammo, pulling out a fresh clip. "Rifle jammed - still don't have that reload trick down."

"Yeah, the phaser rifles are looking like a better option all the time."

"Yeah. Too bad Pinkerton won't hand em over."

Marcus walked to the door and kicked it open, roadie running down the walkway to street level, where a pair of turrets were still spewing gauss rounds, although they weren't hitting much as their targeting systems were shot. "Fuck, keep out of those turrets' line of fire!" A trio of Longswords joined the fight moments later, firing their 110mm cannons at the horde in the streets. "DAMN, it's good to have air support!"

"Pull back!" Drones screamed as they retreated out of the city, trying to avoid hypersonic bullets, tank shells fired by fighters and the as always-hard to put down Gears of the COG.

"Never seen Grubs run like this," Dom said, stepping forward. "Running won't help! I'll just shoot you in your asses!"

Dom fired his lancer at the retreating Locust, actually managing to kill a few of them.

"You ARE pissed today."

"Damn right! I miss my family! I want my life back."

JACK reappeared. "Control, this is Delta. Locust are retreating."

"Great work, Delta. XCOM and Colonial forces are pushing them out of the city." Marcus knew that the Gears were too spread thin, so their help was appreciated. "Anya, you ok?"

"It was close, but I got out in time."

Dom rushed to the bot. "What'd you find?"

"Dom—"

"Tell me, Anya: don't bullshit me."

Anya sighed. "That Jane Doe I mentioned was at the hospital… but she was checked out a few days ago. I'm sorry, Dom."

The widower screamed in anger, punching a car. "Goddamn it! I lost her again! DAMN IT!"

Marcus sighed. "Copy that, Anya. Delta out." he turned to Dom. "Dom—"

"Just…give me a minute, Marcus."

The Gears left him alone, letting him grieve.

"Not again…"

* * *

 **BGM: Armored Prayer, Gears of War 2 OST**

King Ravens and Vipers flew over the capital city, supporting Centaur IFVs and APCs.

Richard Prescott stood beside Admiral Adama and Captain Drake, with Ron standing behind them.

"Humans are no strangers to war. After all, we've been fighting for as long as we can remember. War is all we know. In the past, we fought for imulsion. We fought for country. We fought for freedom." A trio of Ravens flew overhead. "But all that changed after E-Day. For fifteen years, we've been fighting for our very survival against inhuman, genocidal monsters. But it is a fight we cannot continue."

* * *

Homura Akemi studied her Lancer assault rifle, given to her by the Starfleet personnel as Carmine spoke up. "Why Landown, sergeant? Why can't we just drill down here?"

"Because the Locust cannot dig through the granite bedrock, Private."

Dom looked at Homura, still confused as to why she was on board. "Ok, little girl, WHY are you on this chopper?"

"I am not a little girl, Corporal Santiago. My body is young, but my mind is far more ancient than you know. And Landown is still the best place to hit them in their own territory."

"I heard there's a shitload of grubs down there, sir!"

Marcus scoffed, partly in amusement. "More like ten shitloads."

 _Humanity faces extinction, unless we end this war_ now _. We had hoped the Lightmass bombing would decimate the Locust Horde. But they survived. And have returned, stronger than ever. They've brought with them a force that can sink entire cities. Even Jacinto, our last beacon of hope through all these dark days, is now at risk. Soon we'll have nothing left to defend. And that means we have only one option_."

Delta's Raven joined a larger force of Ravens.

" **Attack**. _Gears, what I ask of you now is not an easy thing, but it is necessary. If we are to survive. If we are to live long enough to see the seasons change, our children grow and experience a time of peace that we have never known, then we must now take this fight to the Locust_!"

* * *

Adama knew that Prescott was making a speech focused more on destroying their enemy, which was the only reason he was keeping quiet, and that were were people in the Colonial Fleet that said the same things about the Cylons.

"We will go to where they live and where they breed and we will destroy them!" The gears in front of them cheered, Stroud and Hoffman sharing a worried glance while the stoic Admiral stood silently.

" _This_ is the day we take the battle to the heart of the enemy. _This_ is the day that we correct the course of human history! _This_ is the day that we ensure our survival as a species!"

* * *

"Soldiers of the COG, my fellow Gears, go forth and bring back the hope of humanity!"

Marcus shook his head. Prescott was being over optimistic. The only hope they had was to give the Starfleet people time to build those ships so they could leave.

The Ravens landed "Sergeant Fenix!" And speak of the she-devil. The Pendulum Wars vet turned to see Lunamaria Yamato, her husband and Jaden Takeo, the Spartan, whatever he was. "Thought you were on maternity leave, Commander. What, Pinkerton finally make you abort?"

"Funny, Sergeant, after what our people found at that farm run by the COG last month, you're the last person that should be saying that. Besides, the man's pro-choice: if people want to carry to term, he lets them, same with abortions."

"Sergeant Fenix?" The group all turned to where a man with a cowboy hat approached them "Welcome to the big sucks, Sergeant! You ready to hit the road?"

The Sergeant nodded. "You know it,"

The man smirked. "Well, let's go chuck some bullets at them grubs!" he shouted, gesturing to the assembly area where several Assault Derricks were sitting, waiting.

* * *

 **USS _Ra Cailum_ -science labs**

* * *

Rutia and Vahlen were VERY busy working on the imulsion program.

If they could find out how it worked, they could find a way to reproduce its' effects for the ship's impulse reactors, supplementing the deuterium.

"This is odd." Rutia 'ehed' without looking over at the former XCOM scientist, which annoyed Vahlen greatly. "The fluid seems to be attempting to break out of its' containment unit, like an animal from its' cage."

"What, you think it's alive?"

Vahlen's eyes narrowed slightly. "It just might be… " she said. "Reports indicate Locust react violently when exposed to Imulsion, mutating them into… _Lambent_ I believe the Gears term was. If Imulsion was a simple fuel source like oil… this would not happen… sure it may be toxic, but to cause a mutation of such a scale? We have tissue samples available of Locust and Humans, correct? I suggest we expose them with Imulsion… and see what happens in the sensors."

"Yup. Cassie, bring up tissue samples 124 and 795, and contain them in a level-8 containment field." The doctor looked to her human counterpart. "Don't want to contaminate the rest of the ship."

"Indeed." The smallest drop of the substance was introduced into the cell cultures, both of them watching what happened.

The human cells were slowly invaded and taken over, like a virus, while the locust cells were infected much faster. "It's a goddamn parasite. It's a parasite in liquid form."

"We must inform the captain and evacuate our people off of Sera's surface." Rutia laughed as Vahlen went for the comm. "Oh, really? Come on, doc: half the crew's been exposed to the atmosphere down there. Hell, I've gone down there. We're all probably infected by now."

"It infects humans at a slower rate," Vahlen said, looking at the readings. "But the more contact they have with Imulsion, the worse it will get! We have to limit the damage so we can develop a proper antibody to it!"

"Leave that to the boss to decide. We'll call him, but don't expect us to leave."

* * *

"Kill it. With fire."

"It's not that simple, sir."

Ron chuckled out loud, getting the attention of Prescott and Hoffman. "It is. Find a way to kill it and get the infected tissue restored to normal." Ron cut the link as the pair approached.

"Is there a problem, Captain?"

"Oh, yeah, Chairman. When were you going to tell us that imulsion was parasitical?"

Prescott was taken aback. "What?"

"My doctor's been running tests on the shit. Again, when were you going to tell us?"

Hoffman blinked, looking at Prescott "Chairman…" he growled, "What's he talking about?"

Prescott sighed, closing his eyes for a minute. "…What I'm about to tell you, does _not_ leave this room." He spoke. "Adam Fenix… Marcus's father… he was in contact with the Locust Queen Myrrah _before_ E-Day."

"What?!" Hoffman shouted. "He _Knew_ the Locust- Fuck _YOU_ Knew?!"

"Not until it was too late," Prescott shook his head. "Imulsion is poisoning the Locust, turning them Lambent… but it's also deadly to humans. You've heard of the cases of Rustlung, Colonel? That's just a stage of Imulsion infecting us… it's completely possible that - unless we deal with this parasite… Humans will become just like the Lambent Locust. Adam tried to help the Locust - make it so they wouldn't have to attack the surface… but that Queen bitch was too damn impatient, and… E-Day happened. "

"He tried, I'll give him that. But no more secrets. I want every SCRAP of information, no matter how classified, on the imulsion problem. We need to find a way to kill it without killing us."

"…That brings up another… problem, Captain. Adam Fenix is alive and well."

Ron's head slowly turned towards Prescott, as did Hoffman. "You're telling me he's alive? How?"

"We brought him to a secret research facility. And that's ALL I will say, even if you kill me, Captain."

Ron shook his head. "Keep that secret to yourself, but you will give Sergeant Fenix one HELL of a public apology once this is done. Am I clear?"

Prescott nodded, Hoffman glaring at the chairman and looking ashamed of himself.

"Pinkerton to Yamato."

* * *

"Takeshi here," he said. "What's up?"

" _I'm ordering the colony ship construction sped up. Imulsion's a parasitic lifeform._ "

"PLEASE tell me you're just in a particularly sadistic mood and are just joking."

" _Takeshi Yamato, you know me when I'm joking._ " And he did.

And he wasn't. He looked at the Gears of Delta Squad as they approached Landown, who were curious as to the conversation.

Takeshi sighed. "OK, so… what does that have to do with me? I don't know how to kill a parasite."

"Leave that to our people. Get down into the Hollow and kill as many Locust as you can. We need to buy time. Pinkerton out."

Takeshi sighed before he got the message: he was going to be getting heavy imulsion exposure.

"Oh, my life sucks."

"Welcome to the war, Commander. Command, how long until we reach the drilling site?"

"The town's central monument is your target, Delta. Your grindlifts are keyed to drill down at those coordinates."

"First we need to get there," Jaden said, walking to the front of the Derrick as he manned the Heavy machine gun. The vehicles slowly moving through the Mountain ridge. "It's too damn quiet… Locust _have_ to know we're coming… "

"They are, but the Raptors are killing every Seeder in the area." Small mercies, at least: the Raptors were faster than the KRs and far more heavily armed, plus they had a datalink with the Ra Cailum providing targeting data for anything out in the open.

Meaning anything on the ground was dead. Very, VERY dead.

"The only real dangerous areas are the sinkholes and the town itself: we have reports of Tickers in the town."

Jaden HATED Tickers. The little bastards ran up and blew themselves up in your face! Ron's standing orders were 'capture one: I want another pet'.

He was an odd one.

' _They're almost as bad as those Kamikaze Grunts…_ ' He thought, as the Rig "Betty" continued to roll forward towards Landown with the rest of the convoy. ' _But Grunts used those fucking plasma grenades… WHY does this guy want to make a Pet out of everything we encounter?_ '

"This is KR-79, no sign of enemy contacts."

"KR-46, copy that."

"Viper 754, callsign Kat: we're picking up Nemacyst in the air, we're intercepting now."

While he was glad that the Colonials were keeping the skies clear… he _was_ starting to get a bit board. Not that he didn't _appreciate_ not being shot at… but it just felt as if it was moving all too smoothly.

Then again, Starfleet were the kings of OP…

"CONTACT!" A mortar round impacted a Raven, destroying it. "KR-42 is down!"

"Heads up, Delta! We got shit flying at us!"

"No shit, Dizzy!" Marcus raised his Lancer, but the mortars were hit and destroyed before he could react.

"That is why I am here." The Gear looked at Homura, who calmly reloaded her own Lancer. "How the—"

"She can stop time."

Marcus and Dom looked at Lunamaria. "WHAT?"

"It's true," Takeshi remarked. "We picked her up along with a few others on one of our stops, and a few of them have… unique powers. Homura's are time-related."

"You're shitting me."

"Sadly, Dom, no, we aren't. Homura's actually over 500 years old."

More explosives came in, only to meet bullets mid-flight, fired from a Lancer.

Homura's. "With her around, we could win the whole war, Sarge!"

"Yeah, right." If she could win it, Ron would've sent her down day one. Instead, they were building ships to leave.

"So, what's your weakness, girl?" Homura glared at Marcus, though she accepted the hand offered before more fire came in, Homura spinning her shield again while holding onto Marcus.

"Temporal distortions," she replied.

Marcus took careful aim at the rounds, popping off three rounds, which stopped midflight before the bullets impacted, destroying them when time resumed. "I… You'll have to rely on your own aim for the rest."

"Spartan, get on the minigun!"

"Where the fuck do you think I've been this whole time!" Jaden shouted, pointing the machine gun up towards the sky, and unleashed a spam of bullets up into the air - cutting apart the Mortars heading their way before they could hit the Derrick.

"Raptor 71, Derricks: we just hit a mortar platoon. You're clear."

"Copy, Raptor 71. Nice shooting."

The larger gunships stuck close, making low orbits of the ground force. "This is UNSC Saratoga. MAC gun is spooled up. Requesting targets."

Jaden smirked. A MAC gun would ruin some days. "Saratoga, would you mind pointing that thing at Landown? It WOULD kill every Locust in the area."

"Saratoga _copies - here comes the rain._ " Jaden leaned back from the position, looking up at the sky as he held his teeth, before there was a loud sound of thunder.

"Holy shit, what the fuck was that?!"

"Magnetic accelerator cannon. We call it a MAC gun. Not as dangerous as the ones mounted to, say, cruisers, or even the Spirit of Fire, but it's big enough to level a city."

Marcus chuckled. "Too bad we can't level the tunnels with that thing. Hammer of Dawn all over again."

* * *

Landown was in ruins, and for good reason: it had killed mortar crews, tickers and Locust en masse. Sometimes it was the UNSC that were the masters of overkill.

Still, Jaden was looking forward to the attack in the Inner Hollow. At least he'd have something to shoot at.

Takeshi was still looking over his new Lancer, the old one having been taken apart by Sonja and Lily and put back together in less than a week.

The new weapon was modular, with the ability to switch to Phaser abilities or any other energy weapon, and the chainsaw blades had been remade with tritanium, sharpened to a monomolecular edge. He was going to get a lot of work done with it.

First things first: he had to actually learn how to use a rifle.

"Keep the stock tight to your shoulder, pull, never squeeze the trigger and don't rely on the compensator. You actually NEED to maintain your grip on the weapon and pull to keep it nice and level."

Takeshi sighed. "Give me a sword any day."

"And Ron will forever kick your ass with that outlook." Lunamaria smacked her husband upside the head.

"I know, I know," he said, rubbing the back of his head briefly before grabbing the rifle with both hands again, and aiming at a nearby rock.

" _Oh, look here! Take's_ actually _learning how to shoot_!"

"Ron, PLEASE piss off."

" _Takeshi, I am in the most murderous mood you have NEVER seen. Allow me to take amusement from whatever I like, please: keeps the rest of the universe safe_."

"Really? Then why aren't you down here?"

" _Because if I were, EVERYTHING would die. Wouldn't be fair to the Gears_."

At that point, Takeshi could hear a loud roar… or rather, two - and one of them was that of a chainsaw. "I think fairness is about to be trumped by survival, Ron," he said, his Psionics warning him of danger.

It was a tall, lanky Kantus priest. With a chainsaw staff. "Oh, fuck me with a ten foot pole." Luna put a finger in Takeshi's face. "Not a word."

The Locust jumped onto a Centaur IFV (as it did not have tracks, it was NOT a fucking tank; Christ, WHY does no one GET that?) and hacked the damn thing in half, killing the Gears within.

"Oh, great!" Takeshi yelled. "Ron, get your ass down here! We've got a Locust at the drill site that's wielding a frakking chainsaw staff!" He fired off a burst, and what few bullets looked like they were going to hit were deflected by the staff. "And it can deflect bullets!"

" _Fuck yes! This might actually be fun!_ " The couple looked at one another before shrugging and running into a grindlift.

Marcus and Dom were stuck in theirs, Dom trying to get loose before Dizzy engaged the screaming Locust. "I'll hold him off, boys!"

A shower of light materialized above, Ron laughing like mad as he fired up his own Lancer.

Takeshi and Luna were locked in their lift before the doors shut. Takeshi's reaction was… well, fitting.

"AW, FRAK!"

* * *

The Grindlift pod tunneled down into the earth, as Jaden and Larcei rode inside. The woman was holding onto the restraints tightly, gulping as the pod rattled. She felt a hand on her shoulder, and glanced over to Jaden. "Just relax, keep breathing." He soothed with a smirk "Trust me, this is _nothing_ compared to a SOEIV drop."

"I-if you say so," Larcei replied, gulping nervously again.

"Don't worry about the drop, just keep looking at me, alright?" he said. "We will be fine, we'll _both_ survive this… then we can think of how we're going to start this little family of ours."

Larcei smiled. "Yeah… that'll be fun," she said. "So… any ideas for names yet?"

"Well… not sure if its a boy or girl yet," he mused. "I think… Catherine might be good if its a girl… call her Kat for short… maybe Jorge if it's a boy. You?"

"Hmm…" Larcei mused. "I'd… like to call it Rin if it's a girl… Takeru if it's a boy."

The lift finally stopped. "Oh, thank God."

"This is nothing. You should've seen… Reach…" The pair beheld the Inner Hollow.

Earlier in the war, they had seen the Outer Hollow, which was, for lack of a better term, barren and dead.

This was… strangely beautiful, full of life.

" _This is Delta-One to Control! Anya, do you read? Dizzy, Dizzy are you there?!_ "

"This is Spartan Takeo: we don't have standard comms down here." He informed, "We've hit the bottom, but don't worry - if Ron's up there Dizzy will be in good hands."

" _Delta-One, this is Alpha-One,_ " another voice chimed in. " _We've lost contact with the surface - and we're limited to short-range comms, but we have eyes on a Seeder ahead._ "

" _Roger that Alpha-One, Good Hunting._ "

Seconds later, the voice of Carmine came through. "Sarge! Can you hear me?"

"Carmine, what's your position?"

"I don't know, Sarge: my lift went way off course!" Larcei and Jaden shared a look. The COG decided not to let the Starfleet people work on the lifts. And this was the result.

"Is Tai with you?" "No, he jumped out before we launched to fight that freaky ass Locust!"

"This is Specialist Yamato: don't worry. My uncle's watching his back. Nowhere safer. Come on, let's get moving. We have to link up with the rest of the force."

* * *

 **Jacinto**

* * *

"They won't leave." Sonja groaned, VERY annoyed. "Of COURSE they won't. Why do we have to deal with idiots that can't get the message?"

Sonja, of course, referred to the Stranded. They didn't actively shoot at the Starfleet or fleet people, but they DID act like assholes. They were determined to remain on Sera, despite the fact that they Starfleet were basically giving them a chance to live a life where they no longer had to worry about Locust, sinkholes, or even sicknesses that have ravished them for years, and not have to worry where the food was coming from anymore.

They were just too damn stubborn for their own good.

"From what Vahlen told me, the Imulsion parasite might make them think otherwise." Lily said, as she set up another Replicator next to some Stranded - several children quickly using it to create food and treats they haven't been able to enjoy for ages. "We don't know how long it will take before it _really_ starts to infect humans... "

"Not long. It takes constant exposure, and the Locust are next to that shit 24/7. Towns like Mercy and in the Deadlands will turn first." That was fact: the longer you were exposed, the sooner it happened. Size also mattered: the wretches were turned first because they were small. The drones would take more time.

"Good news is, we're speeding up construction. Going to have to skimp on some of the features until we leave: warp drive and life support are the only real things we can get operational in the time we've got."

"So long as they survive the wormhole jump," Lily nodded, before she sighed. "I don't know who had it worse… the COG or XCOM… "

"One got fucked from space, the other from underground. I think it's equal."

" _Ra Cailum to Henderson._ "

Sonja chuckled as she finished setting up the power net for the area. "Go ahead, Cassie."

" _The first colony ship is nearly ready for structural stress testing. They're going to need you are Port Farrall._ " The ground then began to shake, though it wasn't from E-hole creation.

"The fuck?"

" _Intercepting comms traffic from Delta-One and COG military control. Patching you through._ "

" _Control, do you read me? Are you seeing this_?"

" _Roger that, Delta. We've also just received topside confirmation that Ilima City - dammit! The entire city has been sunk! Right at your position_!"

" _Anya, it's a giant worm! They're sinking cities with a_ **giant worm**!"

" _And I thought the_ Iconians _were the ones who went overkill on the massive destruction schtick,_ " Takeshi remarked over the comms.

" _TRACK THAT WORM!_ "

"Oh, boy, here we go."

" _I WANT TO KILL IT MYSELF!_ "

Their captain was as eccentric as Howard Hughes at times. "He's crazy."

"Yeah, but it's never boring, Lily. Gotta admit, it's always fun."

"Not saying it's not - just say'n he's crazy."

* * *

"You know, everytime I think we've reached the bottom of the barrel, I realize we've only scratched the surface of the bat-shit crazy stuff Starfleet deals with," Jaden groaned as they headed towards the sunken city. "God-like beings, Genocidal aliens, time-shifting schoolgirls, alien abductions with UFO's… and now giant fucking worms."

"Bit of advice: stop worrying."

"This shit DOESN'T MAKE SENSE. How can I NOT?!"

Luna laughed. "Oh, PLEASE. You haven't seen anything yet. Ron beats the shit out of Q every time we meet, and then there's the Kobali."

"And what's THEIR stick?"

"Oh, they're basically the galactic version of zombies."

Jaden stopped. "…Please tell me you're joking."

Takeshi shook his head. "Nope. We've had to deal with them. Ron hates their guts. I don't like them much, either, to be honest…" He sighed. "They don't shamble around going 'Braaaaaaaaaaaaainsssssss…' all the time, they're a proper species, but… it's their reproduction that makes them zombies."

"What do you mean by that?" Dom asked.

"They take the bodies of the dead and apply a virus to them," Takeshi explained. "This virus reanimates the body, turning it into a Kobali in the process. That is why, to us, the Kobali will never be anything more than corpse-stealing zombies."

"I said it before with Carmine's question about the Locust. They can eat shit and die."

"Second that, Sergeant. Come on, we have to get back into the tunnels those worms dug. We're going to need all of Delta to deal with this shit."

A King Raven then flew overhead before getting hit by a nemacyst. "FUCK! This is KR-54! We're going down!"

"Shit!" Marcus cursed, "Control! KR-5 is down in the sinkhole! We're enroute over!"

" _Copy that delta, Ilima was evacuated but keep an eye out for any Stranded._ "

"Wilco," Marcus nodded. "We're heading for the Chopper - Delta out."

"Yo, Marcus, this is Cole! Don't go to the chopper, man—" Static consumed Cole's radio call. "COLE?! Fuck! Must be another Seeder. Raptor 765, where the hell are you?"

"Delta, Horus: we're in the air orbiting Ilima. Wireless is fraking choppy as shit, but we read you."

"There's a Seeder down here. Mind fucking killing it?"

The Raptor flew overhead, a nemacyst slamming into the aircraft. "Oh, yeah, we can do that."

* * *

Augustus Cole was a simple man. He liked to play Thrashball a little too much, was generally easy-going, and was great with the fans.

His momma didn't raise no impolite boy.

But his squad getting wiped out made him… MAD.

"Mayday, mayday, mayday! This is Delta Squad at Ilima sinkhole! We are under heavy Locust attack! Any KR unit, please respond!"

And he was NOT fucking losing Delta!

The Gear revved up his Lancer Mk-2 grinning as he ran up behind the first Locust he saw - shoving the Lancer through its torso and ripping it in half from the waist-up "WHOO Baby!" He shouted, "Hang in there Delta! The Cole Train's com'n to town!"

He stuck a grenade to another one before gunning down two more, grinning as the grenade exploded, blowing the drone to bits.

"Cole!"

The former thrashball star made his way to the railing, looking down at Delta, plus Jaden, Larcei and the latter's parents.

Yeah, he didn't know how that shit worked, or about that freaky ass little girl hanging around them.

"In the flesh, baby!" He gestured to wait a minute before making his way downstairs, chainsawing through the wall before bashing his way through like a badass. "Tried to tell you to stay away from that chopper, man!"

"Yeah, you did. Thanks for the assist, Cole."

"Yeah, you got it." Marcus looked around, trying to find his squad. Not that he knew. "Where's the rest of your squad?

Cole held up a fistful of COG tags, unhappy about the loss of his people. "Here's the rest of my squad. Except for Baird and Tanner. Got separated from them during the drop. Last message came from nearby"

"101st Airborne redux, anyone?" Jaden suggested, getting a few odd glances. "Huh? Oh right, you're not from… yeah, keep forgetting… I'll give you a history book later, anyways Sergeant Fenix I think we've got our next objective."

Marcus nodded "We do," he said, "Control, cancel mayday - we've regrouped with Cole. Baird and Sigma are MIA, we're assisting with the search."

"Regrouped?!" The glare the girl gave Cole shut him up. The look was… WHAT the FUCK was wrong with the _Ra Cailum_?

"Roger, Delta. I'll try to give you more intel as you go, but you're on your own for the most part."

"Copy, Control. Delta out."

They looked at the tunnel after they exited the ruined building. "DAMN, they dig some big tunnels!"

Marcus deadpanned out one thing. "It's the worm."

"Say what?!"

Dom decided to fill him in. "There's a giant worm digging all the tunnels. It's sinking the cities, too."

"You're shitting me, right?"

"We wish."

"And it's still not the strangest, or worst, thing we've dealt with," Takeshi remarked, before muttering something that sounded suspiciously like 'Damn corpse-stealing zombies…' under his breath.

"This shit just keeps getting weirder!" Cole shrugged, "But I guess the whole damn world's gone crazy by now, right?"

"That it has, Cole… " Jaden sighed, "Come on, tunnel splits off over here - I see Locust structures."

" _Delta, this is_ Ra Cailum _: we're picking up seismic activity near your location. Please advise._ "

"It's a giant damn worm; I thought you knew."

" _Giant worm? DAMN, the boss is going to have fun killing that thing! Probably the most fun he'll have in months!_ "

Cole and Dom shared a look before Marcus shrugged. "Their crew is fuckin' weird."

Jaden laughed. "Tell me about it."

* * *

Former Lieutenant and current Lance Corporal Damon Baird banged against the container the locust had put him in. Seriously, since WHEN did the Locust take prisoners?

"Hey! Anyone there?! COME ON, GET ME THE HELL OUT OF HERE!"

A bright light fizzled as the coffin-like cell opened, and he dropped out. "Corporal Baird." He coughed. "Great. You guys."

Takeshi offered him a hand, which Baird took and helped him up.

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't Locust _kill_ people?" Jaden asked, looking at one of the empty containers. "Have they taken prisoners before?"

"Nope. They just kill us."

"Seriously, though, thanks for the help. They were gonna process me, man!"

Cole activated his chainsaw bayonet, showing how much the Thrashball star actually liked Baird with his rage. "I'll show these bitches some PROCESS!"

"For once, I agree with the Thrashball player: let's kill these assholes." "Motion carried. Let's go kill us some assholes."

* * *

Ron groaned.

"Screaming Kantus fuck just wouldn't GET THE HINT. Ra Cailum Actual to Yamato, come in."

" _Takeshi here, Ron. Good to hear your voice. You deal with the guy with the chainsaw staff?_ "

"He fucked off. Didn't get the hint the first five times his chainsaw didn't get through my shields, but he fled underground. Kelso's gone: went after the screaming asshole. Report."

" _We found out how the Locust have been sinking cities,_ " Takeshi informed. " _A giant frakking worm. Also, they've started taking prisoners for some reason - what that is, we don't know._ "

"I heard. Must not've heard me yelling to wait for me to kill it."

" _RIGHT. Sorry. Still, we're heading back into the tunnels._ "

Ron chuckled. "Oh, I pity you. Try not to get your wife or daughter killed. I'm heading back to Jacinto. As soon as I can, I'll link up with you so we can find that worm. I'm fancying worm steaks today."

" _Understood, Ron,_ " Takeshi replied. " _See you soon._ "

"Don't get killed. I'll head for your location as soon as I can."

* * *

30 minutes later, Takeshi was hating Ron's inability to get to his location as the King Raven he and Delta were boarding was shot at by the Locust.

And to make matters worse, there was a giant worm coming their way. "Oh, for god's sake, not again!"

"Come on, get us in the air!"

Carmine nearly fell out of the Raven, screaming as he did, but Jaden managed to grab hold of his armor. "Come on, I got you!"

"Looks like we're going in!" Takeshi yelled as he saw the worm getting closer with its giant maw open. "Brace yourselves!"

"Oh, fuck! We're so screwed!"

The worm's mouth closed, swallowing the chopper whole.

* * *

Dom was having a NICE dream. His wife was there, he was in bed...

Get your fucking heads out of the gutter; he was getting breakfast in bed before E-Day kicked off.

And Marcus ruined it for him. "Dom! DOM!"

Dom woke up, only to find the rest of the team around him, and they were inside some kind of living creature.

"Tell me… Tell me we aren't where I think we are."

"Hate to say it, Dom… but we are."

Baird laughed hysterically. "Oh, this is amazing. We're inside a giant WORM! How in the COG's name are we supposed to get out of here?!"

Cole fired up his Lancer. "Come on, let's cut our way out this bitch!"

Larcei shook her head. "No, we have a chance, and I say we take it. If this thing's sinking the cities, we have to take it out."

"Good idea," Takeshi replied. This thing's a living organism, which means it has to have a heart somehow. Take that out, we kill it, _then_ we cut our way out."

"Then let's find the heart. Ron, do you read?"

Static came out of Luna's combadge. " _Pinkerton here. Your signal's pretty fucking choppy. …You're inside the worm, aren't you._ "

"And how could you tell?"

" _Bioelectric interference and the regular signal degradation you get from being underground. How the fuck did you get_ INSIDE _the worm without getting eaten_?"

"Umm… well, we… **_did_** get eaten," Luna said sheepishly. "The thing just swallowed our King Raven."

" _Damn it! Alright, I'm accessing my records on worm biology. …I'd get moving, if I were you. You're still in the mouth: you'll have debris coming in, and unless you want to kill all 11 of you, get moving._ "

Carmine, who had thankfully stayed with the group, looked at all of them. "Uh, there's only nine of us."

" _Luna and Larcei are pregnant. Pinkerton out._ "

"He's right," Takeshi replied. "Let's get out of the mouth, pronto!"

"Don't shoot at anything until the captain gives us the go-ahead. Ron, can you get visuals from my rifle?"

" _Barely. Keep moving, don't stop for anything! Last thing you need to trigger is a gag reflex!_ "

"Gag reflex?"

"He means don't make it puke. If we do, we'll have thousands of tons of rock crushing our asses."

A massive wall of hardened material slammed down in front of them. "The fuck is that?" Luna tapped the commbadge again. "Ron?"

" _You're in the mouth, little sister: you've got two guesses._ "

"You're kidding me; that's a TOOTH?"

" _Tooth battery, actually. Time your movements. I'm calling a Raptor down now._ "

"Understood," Takeshi replied. "Get ready, people."

* * *

"Days like this, I wish I stood in bed."

Boomer shook her head as Ron looked out the window, Sayaka Miki and Kyoko Sakura hanging out the side hatch. "Anything, big man?"

"I'm tracking the massive thing using Luna's combadge. It's heading for Mount Kadar, roughly 800 meters underground." ron activated the comm again. "Luna, come in."

The redhead on the other end coughed. " _Oh, hi, Ron! Sorry, dealing with toxic ass gas!_ "

"This thing's biology is playing by the rules. Cut your way out, the hearts will be nearby."

" _What?_ " Takeshi asked in shock. " _Hearts, as in plural?_ "

"Yes, Take, plural. It's a WORM. Every worm has more than one heart. Just cut the damn things until it dies."

* * *

Baird was not pleased. "Oh, COME on!"

"Baird, shut up. Not everything runs by the one heart rule. The Locust have two, for fuck's sake."

"If you think THAT'S bad, you should see the Klingons!"

Takeshi fired up his lancer, hacking through the intestinal walls until they were free of the 'ass gas', as his wife coined it.

Soon, they could begin to hear it - a heartbeat. They were getting close to the first heart.

"Welcome to the heart!"

"Alright, let's get hacking!" Marcus cackled madly, almost reminding Takeshi and Luna of Ron as he marched up to the veins and hacked through them, red fluid leaking out.

"There. One dead worm."

"Uh, Marcus? The asshole said there were more than one heart."

The sergeant growled. "Oh, fuck it, we'll just cut them all!"

And so the group did just that, cutting through and killing two more hearts before the thing finally started heaving in death throes.

* * *

Ron paled. "Boomer. Pull up. PULL UP NOW!"

The Cylon did just that as the Raptor rose.

(BGM: Dune 1983 Main title)

The riftworm shot out of the ground, roaring in pain. "Holy shit!"

"Have to agree with you there, Sakura!"

The worm breathed out its' last breath before falling to the ground.

Soon, the sound of chainsaws was heard as nine Lancers tore into the flesh from the inside.

Out came 12 figures, all covered in blood. "Oh, so she DID get in there."

"What, Akemi?" "I sent her along with Delta, I just thought she fucked off."

Ron jumped out of the Raptor, both girls forgetting who he was for a second before they relaxed.

* * *

"Goddamn it!"

Baird coughed up blood before realizing something. "Oh, this is just wrong. I'm coughing up blood that ain't mine!"

A wet thud was heard a few seconds later. "Having fun?"

Marcus glared at Ron, whose nice clean uniform contrasted with their blood-soaked ones. "I really hate you right now."

"Well, look at my point of view. I wanted to kill that thing! At least I got something out of it." He whistled, and a hissing screech came from above.

"Was that a Ticker?" Takeshi asked in shock. "You managed to TAME one of those things?!"

The beast landed in Ron's hands, jumping out of the Raptor.

And if Takeshi wasn't mistaken, it was PURRING. Homura, who changed into her civilian outfit, removing the blood, said it best. "You are beyond insane."

"It's what I do. Control, this is Pinkerton: Delta's killed the GIANT WORM! Get a fucking Raven over here to pick them up."

" _Uh… copy that. Why do I hear a Ticker?_ "

Marcus pressed a finger to his ear. "He turned it into his pet."

" _…Just when I think I've heard everything…_ " Anya muttered.

Ron's grin was scary. "At least it can't blow itself up." He pulled out a tribble. "That's what this is for!"

"NO!" He made it purr before it exploded.

* * *

Takeshi still had a piece of tribble in his hair.

"Seriously, Ron, one of your crazy experiments is going to blow up in your face someday. And in a way you can't block or regenerate from," he muttered.

"Oh, come on, you knew it wouldn't kill anyone. It was white. The lethal ones are black."

"WHY did I decide to work for you again?"

"Because I'm the best captain a sex-crazed man like you can ask for?"

Takeshi sighed. Hopefully their pickup would get there soon.

The sound of a King Raven was heard, carrying a Centaur IFV as it entered view. "I smell bullshit."

"Look out, Delta: incoming Centaur."

The 'tank' hit the ground, Marcus cleaning out the back of his ear. "Control, I requested a pickup, not a drop off!"

The team's drone, Jack, dropped down a comm screen… revealing Colonel Hoffman.

"Delta, this is Command. You've got new orders, Fenix: Operation Hollowstorm continues, but we didn't have enough intel on the Locust stronghold. We need to accurately pinpoint the heart of the Hollow and take out their leader. Captain?"

"Prescott declassified an intel file recently - don't start, Sergeant, I've ripped his head off already - about a COG facility up north. Delta's being reassigned."

Marcus groaned, even as Takeshi wondered, "What about us?"

"YOU are going back underground. I am going with Delta."

Both Jaden and Larcei paled. Beyond the incident with Skorge, this was the first time he'd come down to deal with a mission in person. "Besides, I've been wanting to get involved in the war."

Dom accurately admitted their collective thoughts. "We're screwed."

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: Eh, more like the Locust are screwed.**

 **Ron the True Fan: Oh, Delta's screwed. They're riding with Ron, remember?**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Oh, right - umm… bad luck, or a version of Riza's unholy piloting skills?**

 **Ron the True Fan: (Evil grin) Find out.**

 **117Jorn: Oh boy… well, only one way to find out. Until next tme…**

 **Ja Ne!**


	28. Chapter 28

**_Raven's Nest_** **-Class carrier CNV _Sovereign_**

 **2 years after the sinking of Jacinto**

* * *

The COG was gone. While its' remnants and newly discovered allies in the form of the hidden Republic of Gorasnaya would continue in the construction of the colony ships, population figures had dropped like a rock. So much so that Sonja has said 'two of the ships are going to be empty and the rest won't even be a quarter full, if that'.

At first, they tried Port Farall, where the ships were being built. The Locust launched three additional attacks on the port, forcing them to relocate to an island base, untouched by the war: Vectes. The base hadn't been used in decades, but the place was Locust-free due to the depths of the ocean keeping the bastards from digging their way to the island. Then the Stranded, using modified fishing boats, began being dicks, attacking the COG/UIR alliance. Ron had put his foot down soon after, telling the Stranded that if they attacked his people, they wouldn't survive.

Three guesses what the idiots did.

Then the Lambent showed up, sinking a frigate and destroying the soil. Prescott disappeared soon after, and without him, the COG fell apart. The survivors split up into two parties: one to head to Anvil Gate, led by Colonel Hoffman, the other on board the _Sovereign_ led by Quentin Michaelson, highest ranking naval officer left in the COG. Any Stranded civilians who desired to leave the planet were already occupying the _Phoenix II_ colony ships, or waiting for the last few to be completed within Anvil Gate, the _Sovereign_ , or other smaller Stranded settlements.

Which brings us to today, where Marcus Fenix is having one HELL of a nightmare and about to wake up from it. Reliving the day he was busted out of prison, only it was Anya who helped him, before everything shifted to the day his father… assumedly died, during the battle outside his old home, fighting Brumak's, Corpsers and Drones. The dream came to an end though when the Raven came up to them, and the pillar collapsing on his dad… and then he woke up.

"Marcus Fenix, report to Hazard Ops. Repeat, Fenix, Santiago and Stratton, report to hazard ops."

"Yeah, I heard you the first time!" He got out of bed, looking briefly at his newly modified lancer. The most obvious addition was the stock, which he was told was modelled off the AR-15 stock, only much more durable. Sonja's comment about the lancer after she began working on it?

'Who the fuck designs a rifle without a stock? A fucking moron.' After that, all of the surviving Lancer 2s were modified with stocks. And their accuracy jumped from passable to almost-sniper quality.

Marcus exited his room, having fallen asleep wearing his armor.

"Hey, Fenix, looking for Santiago?"

He looked at a woman in civilian clothing hanging out of another room. "Nah, I know where he is. Thanks, though."

He stepped past her, going into Dom's new quarters. It was full of plants, as some people still didn't trust the replicators and one wasn't installed on _Sovereign_. The amount of laughing Ron had when he heard the ship's name was heard from the other side of the ship.

It turned out that Starfleet had a whole _class_ of ships with the 'Sovereign' name, and the first _Ra Cailum_ was of that class.

Dom was in the room, clad in a simple set of farmer's overalls as he tended to the plants. The Gear's face was covered with a beard now, having just stopped caring about his looks after… Maria. "Dom, come on" he spoke up, grabbing his attention. "Armor up."

"I've got crops to take care of," Dom sighed, "If we don't grow it, we don't eat - remember?"

Marcus sighed, shaking his head "I think your radishes can survive without you for a while," he reasoned, "Plus Starfleet can beam down any extras even if they don't."

Dom shook his head, but relented. "Okay," he said, grabbing his armor. "Let's get this over with..."

Dom took his Hammerburst, as he stopped caring about the Lancer since the sinking of Jacinto before they exited his quarters. "Sea team, stand by. All hands, this is Captain Michaelson: We have entered Lambent waters. Remain at action stations until we are clear."

"At least the ol man takes the threat seriously. People forgot about those things. Well, not Starfleet."

Marcus kicked open a door leading to the rec room. "Out of sight, out of mind."

"Yeah, well, not me. Those things come back, I'm gonna be ready."

They found Jace kicking at a vending machine, trying to get at the one pack of mints still inside. "Come on, Jace, it's stalk city out there."

Jace waved it off. "Alright, just give me a second." He slammed into it again, but the mints remained stuck. "Damn! Nearly had it that time!"

"That thing has gotta be like ten years old," Dom said, "You'll puke your guts out!"

Jace chuckled "Yeah well, that's a price I'm willing to pay," he said - slamming into the machine again. "Damn!"

"Guys, CIC - now." Marcus said, wanting to get moving again. Jace sighed - giving the machine one last punch before turning to follow the others.

Jace walked up the stairs, but Marcus kicked the machine, and out came the mints. "Mine now."

* * *

 _Fourth Officer's Log, USS_ Ra Cailum _, Commander Lunamaria Hawke, Stardate 90091.5: the_ Ra Cailum _has been in orbit of Sera for over two years, and everything is going straight to hell. While we've celebrated the arrival of three new members of the Yamato family, my stepbrother has gotten increasingly depressed. The fleet wants to leave, but without the colony ships, we're risking damage to the ship. I'm worried for our people on the ground as well as Ron's well-being._

 _If depression is a family trait, I'm glad I'm only his stepsister._

* * *

Luna walked onto the bridge, heading straight for Ron's ready room. "He's not going to let you in, you know that."

"I have to try, Cassie. He won't talk to anyone."

The AI deactivated her hologram before she overrode the computer lockouts and entered Ron's ready room, which was dark as all hell.

"Ron?" Luna asked. "You there?"

"I didn't give you permission to come in, Commander."

"Tough shit, big brother. Morale's going down the toilet with you locked up in here."

"There any reason I should be caring? We've got less then a million people down there, half of whom want nothing to do with our offer to give them a new start. So many people, dead."

"Look," Luna replied. "So we can't save everyone. I can understand if that's getting you down. That shouldn't stop you from trying to save everyone you **_can_**. So grow a pair and get back to work, Boss!"

Ron swung his chair around. "Usually it's me yelling at you to get back to your job."

"You've been in here for almost 10 months, avoiding the crew, only going to your quarters to sleep and regenerate once in a blue moon. Even Jaden's worried, and your relationship with him isn't exactly the most civil."

"Usually."

"Bridge to captain. Message from the Sovereign: the chairman seems to be back."

Ron stood up, looking at his private weapons locker before retrieving a Mk 3 Lancer and his compression rifle, tossing the former to Luna. "Get Jaden, your husband, daughter and my niece. We're going to see Mr. Prescott. And chainsaw him a new fucking hole."

Luna nodded, grinning. "Understood, sir," she said.

Ron seemed to be back, and it was good to _have_ him back.

* * *

A new black King Raven landed on the deck, putting down with a thud. "Let's give him the Stranded welcome: strip the chopper for parts."

The side hatch opened, and out came Prescott with his two escorts. Anya nudged Marcus. "Do you think he knows the COG fell apart after he left?"

"Ya think he cares?" He turned all his attention on Prescott. "Chairman Prescott. Welcome to what's LEFT of the COG."

"I'll have answers for you, but later. I need to see Colonel Hoffman immediately."

"Hoffman's been gone for almost as long as you have, _chairman,_ " Anya informed, "He left to take survivors up to Anvil Gate, holding up there until the colony ships are finished."

"Well, then, who is in command?"

"Captain Michaelson's in command, though Captain Pinkerton and Admiral Adama are still in nominal command of our forces."

"I'd better speak to the gallant captain, then. I have a mission for him. And Sergeant Fenix?" He reached into his armor and handed him a data disk. "You'll want to see this." His guards pushed their way past the other Gears. "This better not be his fucking shopping list. Come on."

Dom shook his head, pissed off. "Who the hell does that asshole think he is?!"

"Prescott's going to find out that an ex-chairman doesn't count for shit with Michaelson."

"Let's find out what's on this thing then," Marcus said, pocketing the disk before his team proceeded towards the only computer on the ship.

"Action stations! Lambent have boarded the ship!" More stalks emerged from the sea, and more lambent drones and heavily mutated Drudges landed on deck. "The fuck; we just stood down!"

Jace opened fire with his Lancer. "Shit, they're attacking in waves!"

Pulse rifle fire impacted the Lambent from behind.

"I know that gun."

"Damn right!" Ron appeared from behind the ship's island, looking mad. He was back from his self-imposed exile, and he was showing that in dramatic fashion. And from the kick he gave to a Drudge, it seemed he was VERY angry.

And from the look of things, Takeshi had drastically improved his aim: most of the bullets fired from his Lancer were actually hitting the Lambent.

Of course, this wasn't to say his accuracy was _perfect_. Single-shot weapons still gave him trouble, but give him something with full auto and he could reliably hit a standard ring target at 30 meters. The target would be outright demolished, but at least he could do that much.

"Where the fuck is Prescott?!"

"Below decks. What, pissed at him?"

"He disappeared 12 months ago and threw our entire fucking operation into chaos, Sergeant. What do you think?"

Marcus chuckled. "Well, you're mad. Good. We'll deal with him together later. Right now, we got to clear out these Lambent."

"Right," Takeshi replied, readying his Lancer. "Let's do it."

More Drudges came out of the stalks, but Ron charged at them, bullets and imulsion pinging off his shields. "Fuck, he's not in the mood, is he?"

"Millions dead, moping for 10 months straight and now he has something to lash out at. Let him deal with the Lambent, Marcus: let's look at that disk."

Anya had a point: Borg-enhanced everything made him durable enough for them to ignore the mutants and walk straight to CIC, as all of them wanted to kill Ron.

The group made their way across the deck, up one of the towers, and into the CIC, dealing with any Lambent that got in their way.

"Fucking glowie bastards. Disappear for six months and they come back full force."

"Could get worse. How long until the colony ships are ready?"

Takeshi shrugged. "Sonja and the engineering crew are busy with the warp drive and basic life support systems on the other colony ships. A couple days until they can support any population at best."

They inserted the disk into a computer, and Anya and Lily worked together to decode it.

The video then began to play. "Finally. Got it."

"Marcus… if you get this message, if you're still alive—"

Anya looked to her lover. "Marcus, it's your father."

"I knew he was still alive. Prescott's getting a nice chat with my Lancer after this."

"I'm being held prisoner by the Locust. I've developed a solution to the Lambent problem and they think they can use it to kill humans as well, but—" Static cut out the vid.

"Anyway to tell when this was made?"

Anya shook her head. "There's no date code. Hang on."

"Ron might be able to do something about it. A few minutes and he could tell you when a vid was made. But he's…" Takeshi looked outside, finding Ron charging at Lambent with an old, broken Lancer 1 with a REALLY big bayonet. "Kinda busy."

The vid resumed. "They don't realize it won't save the Locust. Sera's dying, Marcus and it's the Imulsion that's doing it. It was always the Imulsion, you see."

Takeshi chuckled. "I guess he hasn't heard about us," he said. "We already figured that out."

"But you didn't have a way to kill it."

"Well, there's those nanoprobe torpedoes, but—"

"Brace, brace, brace for impact!"

The Sovereign rammed into a massive stalk. "Ok, fuck this; save that disk for Baird! Let's move, Delta!"

Takeshi nodded, hefting his Lancer. "Right, let's do this," he said.

* * *

Stabbing Drudges got boring, so Ron used his new Retro Lancer, as it had been dubbed, to maximum damaging effect. "This is the chairman!"

"Go fuck yourself, Prescott!"

"I'm holed up in the captain's office; Michaelson's badly hurt and we can't hold the lambent off forever! I need assistance!"

"Prescott! this is Fenix," Marcus called out. "Hold on—we're coming."

"We find him, I get my answers. I might've moped for 10 months, but I never abandoned my post."

"Ron, you literally avoided the crew the entire time and stayed in your quarters. Sonja and Cassie had to help Takeshi run the ship and Admiral Adama took fleet command."

Ron huffed, reloading his Retro Lancer. "I gave the orders when we started this bullshit. They don't need me micromanaging their duties."

"Micromanaging? No," Takeshi quipped. "Keeping morale up in a way that only the slave driver from hell can? Oh, yes, we certainly could have used that."

"Oh, kiss my ass."

Luna and Jaden shook their heads, the former amused. "He's back."

* * *

Prescott was not exactly used to fighting. The last time he was involved in front line combat, if ever, was the Pendulum Wars. As such, he wasn't using the Lancers of the two fallen escorts, but the Snubnose he had been carrying with him. "Prescott, you son of a bitch, keep your fucking head down!" One of the lambent drones shifted its' fire to Marcus, who chainsawed it to death before pushing it into another one of the attackers.

Prescott then checked on Michaelson before pressing a finger to his earpiece. "You must take off! Why not?! Oh, very well, standby."

"Chairman," Takeshi said as the team entered the room. "Fancy seeing you again, after you bolted."

"Commander, I do not have time to deal with you—"

Ron shoved his compression rifle into Prescott's face before he sent the damn thing to its' maximum setting. "Prescott, there are answers to questions we have. You're going to give them."

"We don't have time, Captain! We need to get to the helicopters and get off this ship and get reinforcements." He looked at Marcus. "As you've noticed, your father needs them."

"I've noticed. Let him go, Captain, but we're not done. When this is over, we're going to have a nice long chat."

"Very well, Sergeant."

"So stay here. You've been hit, so you've not going anywhere."

The Chairman nodded.

"Jaden, Larcei, stay with him," Takeshi ordered. "Make sure he doesn't bolt again, or worse yet, die on us."

"Should've handcuffed him to a pipe, in case he pulls another disappearing act."

Marcus shook his head. "He's not going anywhere without his chopper, Dom. Besides, we need those birds too."

"KR-03 is under attack, same with the rest of the birds in the hangar. And I'd watch out for the pipes: they're full of polyps."

Marcus and Dom stared at Ron. "Keep forgetting about that freaky ass eye of yours. You can see through the pipes?"

"The pipes, the walls… your armor, if I use the right setting." Anya smacked the captain, who only smirked, and in that knowing way, too.

Takeshi and Luna stopped for a second. "Wait, is she… She can't be, can she?"

Anya didn't say anything, but the answer was apparently obvious.

The pipes began to shift. "Great, lambent crabs. Too bad they aren't like Tickers."

They collectively pictured Ron with a swarm of polyps as pets.

"NO!"

"No, what?"

They opened fire on the vents, killing some of the lambent freaks of nature. "Let's say some things are unholy, Captain. Even for you."

"No, seriously, what?"

* * *

The group continued heading for the hangar, eventually getting close to the waterline. And apparently something had ripped open a hole so they could _see_ the water.

And the Leviathan which was currently attacking the ship.

"I think we're going to need a bigger boat."

"Captain, that line got old when you said it back at Mount Kadar."

"Hate to say it, Dom, but he's right. Think you can use that phaser of yours to kill that thing?"

"A leviathan that size needs something bigger. A lot bigger."

"The Ra Cailum's phaser arrays?"

Ron looked at Luna. "Are you insane? If so, about time, and if we do, we'll blow up the ship."

"Worth a thought, at least - and we don't need a direct hit, either - we could boil it to death," Luna explained.

"Fuck, Luna, you forgot that if we kill it, the fucking thing explodes. If there's anyone on the bridge, get them to run this ship aground!"

"Tractor beam?" Takeshi opined. "Haul the Leviathan either far enough away to use phasers on it or simply pull it up into space?"

"Too much of a threat to the KRs."

"Fuck it, I'm going to kill that thing, see if I can drag it away from the ship." Ron ran to the hole. "Get to the ship's storage bay: there's two Silverbacks in there if I remember your inventories correctly."

He jumped into the water, disappearing into the depths before the fish started screaming. "Uh, is he ALWAYS fuckin' nuts?"

"Yeah," Takeshi replied. "Sometimes moreso than normal."

"Only way up right now is the lifts for the Ravens. Come on, let's get them up."

* * *

Marcus regretted his choice when the deck collapsed. The Sovereign was supposed to be decommissioned before E-day, and it was showing.

"Marcus, WOOOO, that is one UGLY motherfucker."

"Cole? Is that you? Where's your bird?"

"Baby, we got a grandstand view: we're crossing the bridge, right above the ship!"

"Great, can you find a way to deal with that thing from up there?" Luna asked. "Ron jumped into the water to deal with it, but he might need some help."

"Uh, putting it scientifically? We need to blow its' brains out its' ass!"

"Get Baird to come up with something!"

"Personally, I think the only option we have is phaser strikes. The ship's going to be destroyed anyways."

"Call up the Ra Cailum if Baird can't kill it, Commander. Let's get to those Silverbacks."

The group made it to the Silverbacks, which were basically combat exoskeletons.

Takeshi wanted one. While he was a sword man, there was something to be said about having a minigun mounted to your right and a rocket pod on your left.

He'd talk to Sonja about upgrades later, because while they were scary NOW, Sonja would make them more so.

Enough to take on Ron, maybe.

"IDIOTS ON CARRIER, GET OUT OF MY WAY!"

And speak of the asshole, as his face impacted the storage bay ceiling.

"The fuck happened to you?"

Ron unburied his face from the steel wall, Jace asking how hard that bastard's head WAS. "I made it mad and it decided to remove me from its' person."

"Okay…" Takeshi remarked. "Anyway, Cole and his team are on the bridge we're approaching - hopefully Baird can come up with something from up there.

"Knowing him, Tickers. Shame. I like Tickers."

"You've got ONE, and the fact that you even tamed it scares the piss out of EVERYBODY, Pinkerton." The ship rocked before the massive fish of death emerged from the water, biting into the carrier. "Shoot it! Kill it with fire! And bullets!"

The two silverbacks opened fire, with Ron adding his compression rifle to the weight of weapons being shot at the mutated thing.

More Lambent came onto the deck to support it, Takeshi using his Lancer to keep them at bay.

"Cole, fucking thing is in position!"

"Yo, give us a minute!"

"Fuck your minute!"

"We got our own problems up here, Cap! Guess who decided to rejoin the party!"

"I know, Cole, I can see the Locust on the bridge! Screw this; Ra Cailum, phaser strike, my position! NOW!"

"Copy that, Captain. Firing phasers."

A beam of death impacted the leviathan, causing it to scream before tickers were dropped on it.

"Bombs away! And all that shit."

"You were right about Baird, Ron," Takeshi remarked. "He's dropping Tickers on the thing."

"Hey, I thought you'd enjoy the irony of grub-on-glowie violence!"

"Irony my ass! They've been fighting for decades and you're going to blow up the ship!"

The fish glowed brighter.

"Oh, fuckery."

And then it exploded.

* * *

 _Who the hell is he? …Starfleet officer, if the scraps from the uniform mean any—_

 _Commander, can you hear me— Captain Gutierrez is stepping down and retiring from command of the_ Ra Cailum. _You're going to replace—_

 _Ron?! You're alive?!_

 _Well, welcome to the party, Captain Pinkerton._

 _Get back here, you Romulan whore!_

 _Your service to Starfleet has absolved you of all responsibility toward the destruction of the_ Ra Cailum, _and Starfleet Command hereby gives you command of—_

 _We're cleaning up Janeway's mess right after we clean up Sisko's. Fucking—_

 _You… what ARE YOU?!_

 _I know you hate the Kobali, Captain— What they've done cannot be forgiven._

 _The Iconians have returned, Captain. We are at war._

 _There has to be another way besides rewriting history! We just lost an entire_ civilization _, don't you people_ give a fuck _?!_

 _You are the Other_.

WAKE UP!

A smack from a Retro Lancer's butt finally broke Ron out of his reveillere, as Luna brought him to his feet. "I hate waking up like that. It's the nightmares."

"You alright, Boss?" Takeshi asked.

"I just relived the worst two years of my life. And not the ones on this little odyssey of ours."

"Little dramatic about 2409-10, are we?"

"No. Besides being freed, it sucked. Especially cleaning up after Sisko and Janeway."

"Yeah, well, at least you didn't get demoted for doing the right thing!" Ron sighed before looking at Damon Baird, who was coughing up seawater. "I thought we were with Marcus."

"Explosion blew us clear. No sign of Larcei or Jaden, though." Ron twitched, activating his subspace transceiver's ping. "Roughly three kilometers away. Life signs detectors indicate that they're fine. Pissed, but fine."

Suddenly his combadge went off. " _Ron! Get your borg-ass over here!_ " Jaden shouted, " _I'm here with Anya and Jace - and Prescott, but he's not gonna make it unless he gets help NOW!_ "

"Did he say—"

"Michaelson's dead and Prescott's back. I'll tell you later."

" _Actually, the Captain's alive,_ " Jaden added. " _Damn bastard's hard to kill, but he'll need better medical attention ASAP, but I can't get a good signal to the fleet for a beam out. If I didn't know any better, I'd say there were Seeders, but-_ " there was a loud roar, as everyone looked up ahead as several Brumak's and other Locust monsters began marching down to the beach. " _...scratch that, Locust are back…_ "

"Takeshi, take Delta-Two and find Marcus and Delta-One! I'll reinforce Jaden's position."

"What, you can't be much faster then—"

Ron then ran off, activating his motion accelerator, becoming a blur moving at near-mach speed.

"Ok, he's always had that?"

"Yeah, he just doesn't use it much. Come on, let's go find Marcus and the others."

The group set out, priming their guns and looking for Marcus.

A ticker shot past their position, sans the bomb. "Hey, no explosives! What's their party trick?"

"Besides cuddling up to Ron?" Clayton Carmine shuddered. He remembered Ticky. And he was sure no one wanted to see MORE of them.

"Yeah, I don't want to see more of them around the good captain. Almost as bad as those exploding balls of fur he made."

* * *

"I'D KILL FOR SOME FUCKING TRIBBLE GRENADES RIGHT NOW!" Jaden shouted, lobbing a grenade over his cover - the explosion sending several Locust Drones flying back. "This is getting fucking ridiculous!"

"My uncle knows how to make lethal life! The Locust could take a few lessons!" Boomers and Theron Guards approached the fortified position, firing REtro Lancers and boomshots. "A little help would be nice!" Orange bolts impacted and decapitated several boomers before a fast moving blur impacted the Theron, impaling them on the rather large bayonet.

"I can only think of one idiot that uses a motion accelerator." The blur slowed down, revealing itself to be Ron, who tossed the Locust on the ground before coughing up blood. "Fuck! I hate using that thing."

"Would you _please_ stop doing stuff that makes you do that, Uncle Ron?" Larcei sighed, as she fired her shotgun at another Locust grubs.

"You were in danger, I was the only logical choice to get here quickly. I can handle a little blood." the captain got back to his feet as another Brumak approached. "You still got that Reaver? I got lunch for it! Just have to kill it first!

"Silver's back on the _Ra Cailum_ ," he informed, firing his rifle towards the Locust "Rutia had to give her the monthly check up, along with your Hydra. But if you could save some for her, that'd be great!"

Ron fired his compression rifle at the Brumak, which fired back with its' wrist guns and rocket pack, which impacted the ground and Ron, though it did limited damage to the latter, who was nearly everything-proof. "Ok, I'm going for the head! I want that thing dead, and I want it in one piece!"

The Brumak fired at Ron, who quickly approached it, sword drawn.

"He accuses my father of recklessness, and he does the same thing. Course, he is practically impossible to kill and my father… isn't."

Jaden nodded, having little choice but to agree as Ron climbed the Brumak and began stabbing it. "DIE! DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE!" Eventually, he stabbed it to the point of total decapitation, just as the rest of Delta arrived. "Ok, he doesn't play fair. Anyone know what that guy really is?"

"Cybernetic sociopath with no real morals aside from doing his duty," Takeshi remarked.

Sam, Jace and the eldest Carmine stared at Takeshi, as Ron began forcibly removing the armor from the Brumak.

Anya emerged from one of the containers, covered in blood. Mostly Prescott's. "I did what I could, but he took a direct hit to the aorta and one of his lungs has collapsed. Marcus, if you want any information from him, it's going to have to be now."

Delta's leader marched straight into the steel box, finding Prescott on his deathbed. "Where's that… conversation you promised me, Sergeant?"

"Where is my goddamned father?" Marcus growled.

"The Disk..." Prescott said, before coughing up blood. "Azura… "

"And I'm suppose to know what that is?"

"No... it's a research facility." He informed, "He's been working there… Queen… Myrrah captured it… a few days ago."

"Goddamnit, where's Azura!" Marcus shouted.

"Marcus, come on..." Anya reasoned, however Prescott then pulled out a device from his pocket.

"Encryption… " he muttered, before he chuckled "That old… bastard… he'll be… Furious… "

Prescott stilled before his breathing stopped. He was dead. "Fucking Lambent and Locust cheated us the chance of killing him ourselves. Who was he talking about?"

Baird entered the container. "Hoffman. The bastard is Hoffman."

"The data disk you took from Prescott and the one you didn't want my help decoding? Fuck, and he's at Anvil Gate. That's halfway across the continent."

"We could beam there in seconds. The Ra Cailum—"

"Is needed for evac duty, Jaden. We can send an advance team to secure the area, but Delta's going to have to get there on foot."

"How about a shuttle, or a runabout?" Takeshi asked. "Could defend itself if attacked, and a lot better at survival than King Ravens."

Ron looked skyward for a second. "Delta, I have a present for you. Ra Cailum, send down the Osiris, will you? Delta needs a lift to Anvil Gate, and you're going to need to evac survivors."

"Copy that, sir. Sending her down."

"Osiris?" Jaden asked, but not long after there was the familiar sound of Starfleet engines as they looked up as a Delta Flyer-class shuttle descended towards them. "Ah, that."

"Get to Anvil Gate: we'll deal with the rescue operations. Just try not to wreck my shuttle. I'd like to get back to Earth without losing a shuttlecraft." It was typical for a ship to lose at least one shuttle during a mission. Ron tried to make sure he DIDN'T lose any shuttles and so far, from day one on the first Ra Cailum, he hadn't.

Had them badly damaged beyond repair by Riza's flying, but not outright destroyed.

Delta boarded the shuttle, sans Sam, Anya, Carmine and Jace. "Thank you for flying Delta Flyer Airlines. On your left, you have a replicator that will give you whatever meal you want on your flight over to the historic and lovely city of Anvigad. ...It IS lovely, right?" Sam scoffed. "Ass end of the world, Captain!"

"Sounds like home to me!" Jaden chuckled. "Doubt its gonna be a smooth ride though."

The boarding hatch closed, and the Osiris took off, heading for Anvil Gate. "Well, they're in the shit. Up to here."

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: Shorter then usual, but the last one WAS a 10K monster.**

 **117Jorn: Yeah, we're working fast on these things because we're trying to get to the next Arc fast for… reasons…**

 **Ron the True Fan: You'll find those reasons...when the next arc starts up. (Shifty eyes)**


	29. Chapter 29

**_Delta Flyer_** **-Class shuttlecraft _Osiris_ , 200 kilometers from Anvil Gate, near Anvigad, Kashkur**

 **2 years after the sinking of Jacinto**

* * *

The _Osiris_ was a smooth bird, though the reason the ship was given to Delta wasn't because it was the biggest shuttle: the _Ra Cailum_ had dozens of _Danube_ and _Yellowstone_ -Class runabouts, which were bigger and more powerful.

No, it was because of their squad's title. DELTA Squad. "So, there a reason we're only going at subsonic speeds?"

At the helm, Larcei turned the shuttle to port. "The Ra Cailum's been picking up movement from Anvil Gate to other settlements, as well as non-human lifesigns attacking these ports of call."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning, Baird, we're going in to rescue whoever's under attack by the grubs, pick up whatever they were planning to bring back to Anvil Gate and head to the fort ourselves. Just because it never fell during the last war doesn't mean the Locust can't get in. Plus it might be worth making an olive branch."

"Sounds like a plan," Jaden said, restocking his ammo. "…out of curiosity, which do you think is worse: Locust or Lambent?"

"Doesn't matter if we just kill them."

"Speaking of killing, listen to this." Larcei activated the comm, and in came a familiar voice.

" _—hold them off as long as I can! This is Truck 54! Anyone out there?!_ "

Marcus pressed a finger to his ear. "I'll be damned. Dizzy, that you?"

"Marcus Fenix?! I'll be a monkey's uncle; where are you, son?"

"Board one of those fancy Starfleet shuttles. Hang tight, Dizzy. We're coming in at full speed."

Larcei nudged the throttle forward slightly, accelerating the shuttle to mach 1.7. "ETA to Dizzy's position: three minutes. Get loaded up: I'll provide air cover from the shuttle. Good luck, guys… and Jaden, don't die out there."

Jaden looked insulted "Larcei, you know as well as I that I am _very_ hard to kill." He said, before smirking as he kissed her quickly before putting his helmet on. "Geronimo!"

"Wait is he-" the hatch to the Delta Flyer dropped open, before Jaden leaped out, following a several hundred meter drop… which was accompanied by some music, as he slammed fist-first into a Locust.

Blood and bone exploded from the Locust drone's head before Jaden rolled, firing his MA37 at the Locust before the Osiris flew down, the rest of Delta jumping out of the shuttle. "Let's go, Delta!" Lancer fire impacted Theron Guards with more ornate armor, killing the Locust while the Gears took cover, taking advantage of the walking distraction. "Kill the humans!"

Marcus groaned as he heard the unwelcome and familiar female voice as a large insect flew in. Queen Myrrah was on its' back, wearing war armor."No. She fucking drowned in the Hollow!"

"Well actually, she fled on a Reaver," Jaden said. "I don't believe someone's dead till I see the body…" He opened fire on the flying beast the Queen rode on. "…let's correct that, shall we?"

The massive war beetle just took the bullets, shielding the bitch from everything: bullets, Boomshot rounds, even a phaser strike from Baird's new phaser rifle. "The fuck!?"

"We're going to need more firepower to kill this thing! Osiris, can you hit that fucking beetle?"

" _I can hurt it, but the_ Osiris' _weapons aren't exactly suited for shit like this: Sonja actually downgraded the weapons in favor of engine and shield power_!"

Marcus ducked into a building before the beetle opened its' mouth, firing off a beam of heat. " _Delta, that thing's using a high-power IR wave_!"

"We noticed! Drive it off!"

The _Osiris_ flew towards the creature as it fired off its main weapons - strafing the beast. It growled, as it began chasing after the shuttle - as Larcei allowed it to follow her, to draw it away from the others.

The Gears emerged from cover, Jaden snapping a Theron's neck as he joined them. "Ok, I hate bugs."

"Yeah, that's because humans are hardwired to react to things that scuttle—"

"Shut up, Baird."

Dizzy whooped, swinging his arms around before clapping a hand on Marcus' shoulder. "Nice timing, boys! Saved my ass! Not that I ain't happy to see you, but what are ya doing here? Thought you were with Michaelson on his boat!"

"We need to get to Hoffman, Dizzy," Jaden replied. "Got some intel for him."

"Yeah, he's still around! Commanding the fort! I run supplies between here and the other camps, when I can get past the grubs, that is." Baird held up the decoder for the datadisk. "Does Hoffman still have that datadisk? The one I couldn't crack?"

Dizzy laughed. "Sure he does. Still cussin' about it, too! Say, you got the magic words to break it open?"

"Oh, yeah. Come on, Dizz, let's get the ammo. Osiris, come in."

 _"I'm here, Marcus. Myrrah was NOT happy to see the shuttle, and I had to use concussive shots to make her piss off. How's Dizzy_?"

"Dizzy's fine - seems he's been running supplies between camps these days."

"I got ammo that needs deliverin' to the fort, little lady! Mind giving me a hand?" The _Osiris_ flew overhead before putting down and the rear hatch opened up. " _Take every gun and bullet. I'll get us to the fort inside an hour_."

Marcus looked inside the massive arms store, finding a set of VERY special weapons among the more common Lancers and such.

Five Mk 4 Long-range Anti-armor/materiel recoilless rifles, commonly and more popularly known as Oneshots. And they had ammo.

"Oh, I'm going to enjoy this."

* * *

As the Osiris took off half an hour later, Myrrah watched the shuttle take off. "Marcus Fenix, you foolish boy. I will not allow you to get one step closer to your father." She urged the Tempest forward, and to fire its' 'beam' at the shuttlecraft.

It did no damage, much to her dislike.

However, it made its pilot annoyed. "OK, that needs to stop," Larcei remarked. " _Osiris_ to _Ra Cailum_ Actual, the Locust Queen is back and in some kind of Reaver-like thing that's taking potshots at us. She isn't getting through the shields, but it is getting annoying. Can we get some fire support?"

" _We see it. Firing phasers._ "

A lance of light impacted the Tempest, sending it crashing to the ground, though it didn't kill either the Tempest or its' rider. " _She's down. Anything else?_ "

"Not right now, Commander. I'll call when we need help."

The Osiris banked before Cole spotted something. "Oooh boy. Marcus, we got trouble!"

"Yeah, I see. _Ra Cailum_ , we got a fuckton of Locust on the march to Anvil Gate. I think we need to brighten their days."

" _Targeting data, please. I can't blindfire on a starship._ "

"I'll fire off a probe into the middle of their formation," Larcei informed, hitting a few buttons to reconfigure the launcher, then sending the probe out as a targeting beacon.

It landed in the middle of their formation. Soon after, five lances of light impacted the Locust convoy. However, a sixth hit the Osiris. "Corpsa, what the fuck?!"

"Malfunction in the firing system and targeting scanners! We haven't used the phasers in over two years!"

"Dammit!" Larcei yelled. "That blast knocked out the impulse engines! We're going down!"

"Baird, can you slow this thing down?!"

"Oh, it'll slow RIGHT down. When we crash." The Delta Flyer-Class shuttle slammed into the ground, but as the shuttle was harder, it survived. The ground did not.

The shuttle ended up at the end of a thirty-foot trench, about ten feet deep at its end point.

"Fuck, what is this thing made of? A Raven would be scrap metal by now!"

Larcei coughed as she exited the cockpit. "Duranium alloy with a LOT of tritonium reinforcing plates. My uncle wanted this thing to be a tank. And it is."

"I'll say," Jaden remarked. "Not even Pelicans are armored this well."

Lights shined on the Osiris' outer hull before Marcus opened the outer hatch. He had a Lancer shoved in his face before its' user, Colonel Hoffman, lowered it. "Fenix? What the hell—"

"Not now, Colonel: There's a grub army on the way to Anvil Gate. And this thing needs a tow."

"I can fix the AGFG, but the engines are shot," Larcei informed. "Mind giving us a tow back to Anvil Gate, Colonel?"

"Uh… right," Hoffman replied. "If there's grubs on the way, we might need that thing, even if the engines are busted - park it behind the gate and shoot at anything that comes in."

A tow cable was wrapped around the shuttle before it was dragged out, though it took four Packhorses to get it moving before the AG field activated, allowing it to hover above the ground.

"I'm guessing you didn't come halfway around the world to inquire on my health, Fenix."

"Sorry to say we didn't. You still got that disk you took from Prescott?"

Both of them stepped into a Packhorse, and Hoffman drove them back to Anvil Gate.

"Yeah, I do. Why?"

"It's got data on some place called Azura. Prescott gave me the data key this morning… just before he died."

"Prescott's dead?"

"Took a bullet to the heart. His last dying words were literally to send us after you, get the disk and retake Azura."

Hoffman was silent. "Fenix, that was the freakiest shit I've heard, and I have no idea what to say. That's a first for me."

* * *

 **USS Ra Cailum**

* * *

Takeshi looked at the damage the phasers did to the invading army. It thinned their numbers down, but a malfunction in the secondary core made the ship target the _Osiris_. He wasn't happy.

"I want those things double-checked, triple-checked, quadruple-checked, quintuple-checked, even hextuple-checked if you have to!" he ordered. "I do not want that happening again!"

"Commander, we've been working on it since the damn thing fired off. Remember, we haven't used the phasers in two years; hell, Sonja's engineering crews labelled them 'non-essential' thanks to construction of the colony ships. So, if you want to blame someone, blame Commander Henderson, sir."

"That's an excuse. Get it done." The tactical officers walked off.

"A phaser nearly kills an away team, you don't care. A phaser nearly kills your daughter, you get mad. Double standards, Takeshi?"

"Maybe," Takeshi replied. ""Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. We all have our faults."

Luna shrugged. "Sad to say that we've been neglecting our jobs. Ron's depression caused everything to go straight to hell, which made US care less. I'm glad to see Ron back in action."

"Me, too," Takeshi replied. "Hopefully now we'll be able to finish this mess sooner rather than later."

" _Pinkerton to bridge: evac from_ Sovereign's _wreck site is complete. Delta-Two is requesting beam out to Anvil Gate_."

"What about you, Ron?"

" _I'm not feeling too good. I'm going to beam back to the ship and pay a visit to sick bay._ "

"Copy that, sir. See you back on board."

" _Takeshi has command until I come back. Pinkerton out_."

"Understood," Takeshi replied, before he sighed. "Great… in charge of not just a ship of 2500, but most likely the entire fleet… I hope Ron gets back soon."

"Could be worse. You could've failed standard command officer classes."

"Luna, I DID fail standard command officer's classes. I didn't take command of the _Murasame_ because of that."

Luna smirked. "You're screwed."

* * *

 **Anvil Gate**

* * *

Baird quickly decrypted the disk, getting data on Azura streaming before their eyes. "There we go: Azura. No maps, but plenty of data and pictures."

"It's an island. How the hell do you hide an island?"

"If this were our universe, I'd wonder if it was cloaked," Larcei remarked. "But the largest cloaking technology I've seen you all field is on things like JACK."

"More of Prescott's top secret bullshit! What the hell's a Maelstrom Barrier?"

At the mentioning, a hurricane appeared around the island.

"Weather control technology. So primitive yet equally advanced as we are. Make up your goddamn minds."

"You're joking, right? No one can control the weather."

Larcei smirked. "When we manage to get back to our universe, remind me to show you around Risa. It was originally a geologically unstable rain-soaked world. And it still would be, if not for the geologic stabilizers and weather control systems to make it **_the_** main tropical resort world in the United Federation of Planets."

"Can we beam in?"

"No. EM interference would screw with the targeting sensors. You could end up underground or in the air, 50 feet up."

"Meaning the only way in is by getting under the storm. Would a shuttle get through?"

Larcei and Jaden shared a look before they shook their heads. "No, we need a sub. Mostly because if we damage ANOTHER shuttle, Ron would kill us."

"Well, there's an old sub laid up at the shipyard in Endeavor…" Hoffman posited.

"Yeah, if it's seaworthy, if you can get the motors running, and if you can fuel it," Baird informed.

"That's where I come in." Dizzy removed his hat, straightening out his do-rag before putting it back on. "I may not look it, but I was merchant marine. If there's a sub, I can fix it. We just need to find the gas."

"We could make a stop at Mercy, or Char. Either one's our best bet." Marcus didn't look happy about the former. It was Maria's hometown.

"What's at each place?" Larcei asked.

"Imulsion pumping stations. One was hit pretty hard by the Hammer strikes."

"The other was Maria's hometown. You sure you're ok with it?"

"I'm fine, Marcus. I'm over it. We need the fuel."

"Alright, I'll fix up the Osiris. We can clear the road ahead for your trucks. Or I could ask for the Isis. That thing's phasers are more powerful, in case the bitch returns."

"Might as well ask for the Isis, and have Sonja fix the Osiris," Jaden remarked.

"Done."

* * *

"They broke my shuttle."

"Myrrah did some damage, but it was a computer malfunction that caused the Osiris to take a hit. They're requesting the Isis for heavier combat duty. The colony ships are ready for habitation, so most of the engineering crews are heading back to the ship to do major overhauls of the computer before we head out."

"Cassie, remind me to hit those two when we leave. Get Sonja to fix the Osiris and bring it back up here."

"Understood, Captain," Cassie replied.

"And prep the Ra-Horakhty for launch." He injected a shot of painkillers into his body. "I'm going to start killing things."

* * *

The Isis landed a few hours later, Sonja jumping out of the craft and smacking Larcei upside the head before heading for the Osiris. "Seriously? It wasn't my fault!"

"Don't care; your uncle's pissed! So pissed he's heading down to deal with that incoming Locust army. In person."

"Should I be afraid for the Locust, Commander?"

"Nah, probably not," Sonja replied. "Worried about potential collateral? Maybe - he's considering having me push The Button once he's down there."

Larcei paled.

Marcus spoke for the COG when he approached. "Button?"

"He's got an aggression inhibitor in his head. The Button shuts it off."

The Ra-Horakhty then flew overhead, heading for the Locust before the ground began shaking. "The fuck?"

Marcus shoved a Lancer into Sonja's hand before calling out. "STALKS!"

The plant-like forms of the Lambent emerged from the ground, spitting out Lambent Locust of all kinds, including one they didn't want.

"BERSERKER!" came the cry. And indeed, it was one of the powerful Berserker Locust, made even stronger by becoming Lambent.

One of the eyes was covered and the ribcage was glowing. "Baird! We need the Hammer of Dawn!"

" _Oh, NOW you want me to operate the Hammer of Dawn!_ "

"We have a Lambent Berserker!"

Alarm bells practically went off as Baird began working inside. " _Get inside! I've got limited control, and it ain't accurate!_ "

"We're working on it!" Larcei called out.

"It's firing!" Red light landed, impacting the ground. "RUN!"

* * *

"The Hammer? Targeting sensors haven't been working since Jacinto's sinking. Who the fuck was stupid enough to fire it?"

" _Baird, when we get inside, we're going to kill you_!"

Ron chuckled. "Rhetorical question. Ra Cailum, give me targeting control for the ventral phaser arrays."

" _It's yours, Ron,_ " came Cassie's reply.

The Hammer strikes killed every Lambent outside the fort sans the Zerker, but Ron had something far more powerful than the Hammer.

* * *

Marcus panted as he shut the gates. The Hammer converged on the Zerker, impacting it and making it scream. "How's that, you fucking bitch?!"

"Ok, let's get ready for the—" Something impacted the gate, and it wasn't happy. "Oh, COME ON! Even the Hammer can't kill that thing?!"

"I know something that can." The Zerker jumped into the fort, but a light shone down on it. "Hey, bitch! I'ma firin' my phaser! BLARG!" A thin orange beam impacted the Zerker, causing it to scream as it was torn in half before it exploded.

"You're fucking welcome. I'll deal with the Locust. Get to Azura."

"R-right," Larcei replied.

"Want me to hit the Button, Ron?" Sonja asked.

"Do it. I'll be busy."

The Ra-Horakhty turned and flew off, heading for the Locust.

"So, Mercy's our first stop?"

"Yeah, ours. Carmine, go with Baird and Cole. Sub or not, we're going to need reinforcements to take Azura back."

Cole smirked. "No. Cole, we're not going back there."

"If they got people, I don't care where you go." Marcus walked over to a Packhorse, which was being loaded with a vulcan cannon and a metric fuckton of ammo. Anya got into the back of his truck. "Anya, I think you should stay here."

"Marcus, I stayed behind for almost 20 years. Not again. This time, you've got me on your side."

"Huh."

The Isis then took off, flying off ahead of them. "We'll clear the area ahead of you."

"Right. Let's move."

* * *

It took several hours, but the trip to Mercy was rather boring. Many burned corpses dotted the roads leading to the town, citing Larcei's work. But that meant little as the group entered the outskirts of Mercy. "Ok, something's very wrong. This is a major Imulsion pumping station."

"And yet it's practically empty. No people, no bodies, no nothing," Larcei said.

"Place was busier then a fiddler's elbow a few months back!"

"Can't've been the grubs. Too bad Pinkerton's dealing with the Locust at Anvil Gate, or I'd ask him for help. Jace, stay with Dizzy and guard the rig. Spartan, you're with us. Larcei, air cover in case the Locust show up."

"I'll keep an eye out."

The Isis took off, orbiting the town.

"Alright, let's find a way to turn on the fuel pumps," Jaden said.

The Gears entered the town, finding something on the pipeline: a capsule. With a timer. "Oh, crap."

"A bomb. Might be motion activated."

"No, detonator's radio-controlled. Meaning we just need to..." Jaden reached for the bomb and flicked a switch. "Turn it off."

"That sounded ominous. Come on, let's go. And keep an eye out for more bombs."

They found two more. "This isn't a trap," Dom said. "This is sabotage."

"Someone wants to blow up the town. Why?"

A bullet impacted Jaden's shields, fired from a common Hammerburst. "Hold your fire! We're Gears! Gears!"

"Get your hands off those goddamn charges!"

"Are you responsible for this?! Why the hell are you doing this?!"

"I gotta stop this damn thing from spreadin'!" the old man with the Hammerburst yelled back. "Just let me get on with the job!"

"The fuck is he talking about?"

"How the hell should I know what it is?! It's-it's-it's some kinda fever!" He tried to close a door. "People started screaming, burning up, fighting, turning crazy! I gotta stop it!" He ran off, screaming.

"Come on! We need to know where you put more charges!"

" _I heard that over your radios,_ " Larcei informed. " _I don't know about you guys but that… that almost sounded like some of the things we saw at Nexus._ "

"Crazy bastard. Towns folk are probably hiding from him."

Jaden's eyes narrowed slightly, glancing back where the charges were. "...if those charges stayed on, would it effect the pumps?"

"Well if you detonate them, yeah - but just sitting there they won't-hey!" Dom saw him flick the charge back on. "What are you-"

"Something doesn't feel right… " he glanced around, "I'm resetting these charges so they'll go off when _I_ say so… on the off chance that old man ain't crazy."

"We'll find out. Come on, let's get inside. Larcei, get in contact with your uncle: we might need that unkillable bastard here."

"I'm… going to take a raincheck on that. Anvil Gate's reporting that he's fighting with a Berserker. And winning. He actually tore the damn thing's arm off."

The Gears shared a worried look while Jaden just laughed. "I'm really beginning to hate that guy."

* * *

Mercy was turning out to be merciless, as the Gears uncovered as they entered the sewers, finding the old man's body, torn apart with scratch marks. "Ah, fuck. Lambent animals again?" Sam shuddered, remembering as a Lambent bull nearly killed her.

With both the horns AND its' explosion.

"I don't think it's just animals… " Jaden mused, looking at the deceased man. He pulled out his M90 Shotgun.

"We need to give ourselves some breathing room. Spartan, you're on your own. Anya, you're with me. Sam, go with Dom."

The Gears were slow to adopt personal shielding from Starfleet, and Jaden was a walking tank only rivaled by the scary bastard at Anvil Gate.

Moaning was heard nearby, and the Gears moved out, pointing their weapons ahead of them before they found the source: a woman, kneeling facing a pipe. "Miss? Are you alright?"

Marcus extended his hand to turn her around, but the woman turned, showing black skin and glowing eyes.

"She's Lambent! It's spread to humans!"

The Lambent human jumped towards Marcus - but she quickly met a faceful of his Gnasher Shotgun, however they heard additional cries in the distance. "Gears! We've got company!" Jaden shouted, with a blast from his own shotgun heard in the distance. "Lambent Humans! A shitton of them!"

"Don't waste your bullets! Use your Lancers!" Marcus fired up the chainsaw after replacing the Grasher, firing it up. As soon as the formers touched the bayonet, they exploded in a cloud of dust.

"Fuck! Carmine had a point about those fucking helmets!" Jaden was suddenly grateful for the helmet. "Ok, let's get the hell out of here! Larcei, call up the _Ra Cailum_! Get that doctor of yours on the horn!"

"What's wrong, Marcus?"

"We got Lambent humans! Patch in Dizzy and Jace, too!"

" _Hang on._ Ra Cailum _Medical is patched in_."

The voice of the scary doctor piped in as soon as they ran out of the sewers. "Ra Cailum _Medical Services: from cuts and scrapes to major diseases. How may I help you?" Dom rolled his eyes before Marcus climbed out into the light. "Doc, we got Lambent humans_."

" _And you're worried. Relax: your exposure's minimal. You're in a fucking Imulsion town, Fenix. It's simple to put two and two together_."

"Imulsion takes time to convert you," Jaden said, "These people have been around the shit day in and day out. Its no wonder they were infected quicker than the rest of us."

"Years. Hell, decades. And that shit's only getting worse. As soon as you get tingling in your arms and legs, you're fucked. Your exposure's been so limited, it's not even funny."

"Fuck the fuel: we need to rearm those charges. We can stop in at Char, and the Stranded can kiss my ass. Hell, if we really need to, we'll just use one of Pinkerton's shuttles."

In theory, a Type-8 shuttle could go underwater for weeks. That was just an option they didn't want to use.

Ron was mad enough.

* * *

Jace and Dizzy awaited the supply of fuel to the tanker before they got a call from Larcei about the Formers. Jace's first reaction?

"Fuck this shit; I'd rather deal with the goddamn Stranded or worse, Mr. Unkillable."

"I hear'y kid," Dizzy said, before they heard the sound of roars in the distance… and they weren't Lambent. "Aww hell… Marcus! We've got more trouble!"

"What is it, Dizzy?" Bullets slammed into the tanker. "Fuck! We got grubs!" "We're coming, Dizzy! Cover the tanker! We're still going to need it!"

"We're still gonna need fuel to get to Endeavour!" "We'll head to Char. Fuck the Stranded. We'll deal with them."

* * *

Dom had left his tags and Maria's necklace at the family grave. They did manage to get some fuel pumping before it seized up, but it was enough to get them out of Mercy. "My great idea to come here. Sorry, guys."

"It's not your fault," Marcus shook his head, as they ran towards where Dizzy and Jace waited. "Come on, we've still got a mission to do."

They emerged on a rooftop, near the entrance to the town. "Marcus, come on! We're good to go!"

An explosion down the tunnel caught their attention, and Locust poured out of the tunnel.

"Aw, fuck! Cover the tanker!"

"DIG!"

A Boomer with a strange weapon fired it, a creature digging underground before it emerged in front of Jaden, exploding in his face.

"Fuck!"

"Hold them off! Isis, we need air support!"

Phaser and micro-torpedo fire hit the enemy forces. " _Doing what I can, but there's no end to them!_ " Larcei called. " _You need to get to the trucks and get moving!_ "

"There's too many of them!"

"Hold them off! Just hold them off!"

Dom's shotgun ran out of ammo, and a Stalk emerged from the ground before knocking him to the ground near the tanker, which had been unhooked from the fuel container.

Jaden watched as Dom climbed into the truck. "Santiago! What the fuck are you doing?!"

The truck drove off, heading into the tunnel.

"Dom! Dom, What are you doing?!"

No response.

"Dom, what the fuck are you doing?! DOM?!"

"Pulling the plug on em, Marcus! Jump!"

Larcei seemed to be the one to realize it first. " _Wait, Santiago are you crazy?!_ " she yelled. " _That's suicide!_ "

"JUMP!"

The horn began blaring. "Don't do it! DOM!"

A few seconds before the truck emerged, they got one final message from Dom. "Never thought it would end like this! Huh, Maria?!"

The truck emerged, slamming into the tank. "DOM! NO!"

The tank erupted in a fireball, devastating all the Locust and Lambent in the area, even as they could hear Larcei cursing over the radio, along with the beeps that indicated she was frantically working some kind of control panel.

The Gears instinctively took cover, but as soon as the blast wave was gone, Marcus tried to get to the wreck. "Dom!"

"Marcus, no—"

"Goddamn it, let go of me! I have to get to him!"

"This is Ra Cailum: away team, what the fuck is going on?! Santiago's lifesigns are damn-near non-existent!"

" _Santiago just rammed a truck into a frakking fuel tank!_ " Larcei yelled. " _I've been trying to get a transporter lock on him with the_ Isis _, but I'm getting interference!_ "

"Put out the damn fires! Extend your shields and purge the oxygen from the environment; it'll allow you to find him visually!"

"Can that be done?"

"It's how we keep air in the shuttlebays! Do it!"

The _Isis_ lowered itself as close to the flames as it could, before they could visibly see the shield bubble extending outward and over the truck. Soon, the flames around it diminished and disappeared.

The shield vanished, and Marcus charged into the wreckage, finding the cab. Inside was Dom, badly burned. For the COG, that was the end of it: the amount of burns would have doomed anyone even before E-day.

But Starfleet's medical tech was centuries ahead of theirs.

" _Got him!_ " Larcei cheered. " _Solid lock!_ Ra Cailum _, I'm beaming him straight to your sickbay!_ "

Dom disappeared in a shower of light. "We have him. Doctor Yulanra's working on him now."

"Yeah. Goddamn it. Get Ron on the horn."

* * *

The Locust were wisely running away from Ron, who had started using his sword.

And cleaver Therons were getting their blades cut in half. An inaudible ping caught the captain's attention as the Locust fled. "Pinkerton."

" _Uncle Ron, it's Larcei,_ " came the reply. " _Marcus wants to talk to you._ "

"Patch him through."

A moment passed. " _Pinkerton, how long would it take you to get to Char?_ "

"What happened?"

" _When we got to Mercy, we found Lambent humans. And Dom… he saved us, but he's nearly dead. We need another gun while Dom recovers._ "

"Very well. I'll get there in a few minutes. Just need to clean up some loose threads."

" _Right,_ " Larcei replied. " _We should be there in a few minutes, too - luckily we haven't had to deal with Locust or Lambent since. We'll see you there._ "

A Theron guard reached towards him, holding a boltok. "See you soon." He shoved his weapon into the guard's head.

* * *

 **Char, Sera, several hours later**

* * *

Char was once a prosperous Imulsion city, headquarters to Griffin Imulsion Corporation, allowing the city to grow VERY fat on its' earnings, though Griffin himself was once an Imulsion rig worker and rode his people hard enough to keep them in the field.

Now? Well, Char was hit hard as fuck by the Hammer strikes. Some buildings had even begun to collapse, and seeing as they were made of steel and concrete much tougher then anything on the Jacinto Plateau, that was saying something.

And it was into this environment that the Isis flew, escorting the truck carrying the Deltas, before the truck came to a sputtering halt.

"Well, that's it," Dizzy said. "We're outta gas."

Jace got out of the truck. "So, this is Char?"

"Yeah, well, it was. And the Stranded here remember the Hammer. They ain't gonna like seeing us here."

Marcus got out of the neighboring Packhorse. "Don't got a choice. We need the fuel to get to the base." He walked on ahead before he noticed something.

No one was talking. "You can stop walking on eggshells around me. I know Dom's in bad shape, but he wouldn't want us moping around. We need to get that fuel to make sure everything we've suffered is worth the end of this bullshit."

"Right," Larcei replied. "Well, might as well get going. If Ron's not here, he'll catch up to us soon enough."

"Maybe he's getting bigger guns."

"Jaden, my uncle is dangerous enough with his bare hands. He doesn't NEED bigger guns."

The moderately lighthearted conversation went straight to hell as they entered the city, finding bodies. Piles of ash in human form, running. "Oh, fuck. These must've been people trying to get out of the city when the Hammer strikes came in."

"They died doing what they did last, like in Pompeii."

"That ancient volcano from your homeworld, right?" Jace asked.

"It was a town near a volcano. Major eruption 2300 years ago buried the city."

"Except we did this to ourselves. This is a mass grave, people. Show some respect." They moved into the 'graveyard', making sure not to touch the bodies.

But they had things watching them.

"Ok, anyone get the feeling someone's putting a gun to your head?"

"Not exactly like that, but I can definitely feel like we're being watched," Larcei replied. "And they don't seem friendly, either. Probably a Stranded; they take potshots at Gears all the time."

"Yeah well I'm not exactly in a very good mood having been _shot_ all damn day," Jaden muttered. "They shoot at me, I'm giving them the Pinkerton treatment."

" _Pinkerton to ground team._ "

"Oh, look, you spoke the unholy name."

Marcus pressed a finger to his earpiece, glaring at Sam. "Delta here."

" _I'm not beaming into that graveyard. It's like fucking Pompeii down there, and the LAST thing I want to do is disturb the ashes. I might be a dick, but I'm not the Kobali. They deserve to rest._ "

"Got it," Larcei replied, as she looked about the area. "I don't blame you. Want us to find a beam-in site?"

" _Somewhere without ashes, preferably. Call me when you find somewhere—_ "

A drum shifted slightly on a higher piece of asphalt. With a long gunbarrel and a bayonet attached. "The fu—" The barrel then tipped over, rolling twice before landing upright and firing at them, two retro lancers spinning in circles, destroying the ash.

" _The fuck is going on down there?!_ "

"A Stranded asshole with no fucking respect for the dead!"

" _Damn it, find me a beam down site and I'll show the fucker some proper respect! Pinkerton out!_ "

The Lancer trap stopped firing, and they examined the damage caused. Dozens of ash people were destroyed. "When we find him, we're going to fucking gut him. Even the worst Gears know better then that."

"Way ahead of-" He began to say, before they began hearing an infant's crying. "…I _dare_ someone to tell me that's _not_ a trap."

"Ra Cailum, lifesigns check, please. Is there a baby nearby?"

"The only life in the area just so happens to be adult-sized. Ignore it."

Jace gingerly navigated past an ash corpse. "You're shitting me. Your sensors can do that?"

"Once, there was a prisoner, broke out of a lunar prison colony. He had no lifesigns, so the Enterprise-D just beamed out anything vaguely shaped like an adult humanoid male. Wrecked a transporter room in the doing because he was like my uncle, but…yeah."

Anya shuddered. "You mean you can tell the difference between adults and children with those scanners."

Jaden groaned. "Starfleet HAS to have the edge in techno-bullshit, doesn't it?"

* * *

It took half an hour and MANY traps, but the Gears and their escorts caught up with the ash-hole at the base of Griffin tower.

Marcus actually tore off one of the trap Lancers and checked the bayonet for its' sharpness as the elevator came down.

"This Griffin guy better have the damn fuel," Jaden growled, glaring at the Ash-hole who flinched under his gaze.

"I think he's scared of you."

"I just walked."

"Walked through two Troika Turrets firing at you without flinching."

"Hey, I like showing off with the Starfleet armor here!"

Ash-hole was scared more of Marcus as he pressed the bastard up to the wall. "You got one chance to not piss me off."

"Hey, hey hey, let's not get—"

"You disturbed a lot of graves, ash-hole. Sure, the COG made them, but we didn't fucking destroy them."

"You wanna talk to Griffin! Yeah, yeah, I get it! Get in here!" Larcei tapped her commbadge. "Uncle, we have a beam in site. Standby."

"Standing by. Want heavy support?"

"Like?"

"MECs and Ronopods. WHY you named them after me makes no sense."

Larcei shook her head as Delta entered the elevator.

"Sure, more the merrier," Jaden said - after a short elevator ride and walk, they arrived at the entrance to the office.

Ash-man pushed the door open. "Mr. Griffin Sir! These COG Guys showed up! They did a great job on the Glowies, now they want some fuel!"

The man in the office wheeled a chair around, glaring at him. "What the fuck are you doin' bringing COG into _my_ city?!"

"B-But sir-"

"Boy, get out of here before I loose my patience!" Griffin waved him off, as Ash-man hastily scurried away.

"Welcome to Griffin Tower, COG. We were here before the Hammer strikes, and we're still here!"

"Buddy, shut up and get off your high horse." Jaden growled. "We have bigger problems then your feud with the COG, which, by the way, DOESN'T EXIST anymore. It fell apart 18 months ago."

Griffin pointed his cane at Jaden. "Boy, you got a lot to learn about respect!"

Jaden's eye twitched behind his helmet. "Respect?" he muttered. "Respect?! Mr. Griffin, allow me to introduce you to a friend of ours. I think you'll like him. Ron, we got those beam down sites for you. And a fucking idiot to introduce you to."

"Understood. Energizing." Showers of light appeared in and around the building, Ron appearing in Griffin's office. "Surprise, motherfucker. Captain Ronald Pinkerton, UFP starfleet, at your service."

"Motherfucker!" Griffin shouted, "How the fuck did you do that COG?!"

"We're not COG," Jaden informed. "Least Me, Larcei, and Ron aren't. We work for Starfleet - the people trying to _save_ your sorry asses."

"Which is why I'm here. My mechanized troops will secure the building from the Locust and Lambent while Delta gets your fuel shipment."

Griffin pulled out a Hammerburst, pointing it at Ron. "You don't dictate terms to me, asshole!"

Ron grabbed the weapon and forced Griffin to fire, the round harmlessly impacting his shields. "He with superior power decates terms. I'm bulletproof and command VERY nasty machines. And I saw what your men just tried to do to Dizzy. Not a good stunt, but your men are still alive, so there's that. So, you let Delta get your fuel, I give you aid in defending against Myrrah, who is coming. She hates Marcus here, and if he had a fucking CHOICE, he wouldn't've come here. So show some real FUCKING RESPECT, hmm?"

Griffin looked at Ron in shock, before he growled. "Fine," he muttered. "But this sure as shit ain't over,"

"Oh, that's what you think, cockbite." Griffin's yelling was music to their ears as Delta left the room. "At least he's getting what he deserves."

"At least we have a way across: cable car runs straight to the refinery. Too bad the Stranded didn't just let us use it to get up here."

"They're right to hold a grudge against the COG, but not Starfleet. Only thing you're doing is trying to help." Jaden had to agree with the Gears there. Problem was, the Ra Cailum had an Iconian after them.

And while he's never faced T'ket in person, he'd seen footage of Ron and Takeshi against M'tara, who nearly killed them.

"Alright, let's get that fuel so we can get out of here." Jaden said. "The sooner we leave the better."

The only way to the building was on foot, on ground level, as the cable car was at the other end. "Great, back down."

* * *

Ron dismantled his retro Lancer, using Griffin's desk to keep the parts separate. "Do you MIND, COG?"

"I'm Starfleet, not COG, jackass. I can always rip your head off with my bare hands instead of protecting you from the Locust, if you like. I'm trying to be NICE here with sending down my best mechanized troops."

Griffin growled. "We were doing just fine without you jackasses," he muttered, "Didn't need ya in the past, sure as shit don't need you now!"

Ron shoved a PADD in his face. It was helmet cam footage from Jaden's suit of a Former. "Oh, really? Take a good look, asswipe."

"The fuck is this?"

"One of your workers. Heavy Imulsion exposure. You fall in, you touch it, the infection grows. Eventually, you become like the glowie Locust. Maybe now you get my point."

"You can fuckin' make shit appear out of nowhere! You could've made that usin' some kinda supercomputer!"

Ron groaned. "Urge to kill retard unwilling to look the truth in the face, rising."

"Humans don't get glowie, asshole!" Griffin rolled his eyes. "Only Locust do! We've been mining this shit for decades _before_ the Locust showed their ugly asses here!"

"The Locust used to be human until Imulsion mutated them. Cue 60 years later, and you've got the Locust Horde. I've even got the COG reports to prove it."

"So the fuckin' COG are responsible for all the miseries, as fuckin' usual."

"You're not listening."

"You're not saying anything I want to—"

Ron grabbed Griffin by the throat, choking him. "Listen to me VERY well, fuck for brains. I. Do. Not. Lie. The COG was looking for a solution to shit like rustlung back then, not causing problems. A bunch of stupid scientists are responsible for all your problems, not the COG, and you should show me some proper fucking respect. Instead, all you do is label me someone else and blame ME for all your problems! Give me ONE reason not to throw your ass out that window and watch you die!"

Griffin struggled to speak as Ron choked him… however he was saved from a gruesome fate from an unlikely savior… as the entire building rattled, as Ron dropped him. "Boss! We've got Locust!"

"As I predicted." Moans were heard from the vents. Ash-man reached for his sawed-off. "The fuck was that?!" Ron actually smirked, slowly reassembling his lancer. "The truth."

The vent cover came off, and a male Former dropped down, screaming like a wretch. "Oh, look, the idiot LEARNS." Ash-man fired the sawed-off at the Former, killing it with a poof.

Ron reassembled the receiver for the Lancer, looking at a gobsmacked Griffin, who looked like his world was breaking around him thanks to that Former. "So, going to admit you're an idiot, or should I just sit down and watch?"

Griffin growled, reloading his shotgun "What I'm _doing_ , is save my castle," he said, as he marched towards the door. "Get the guns up people!"

Ron rapidly put his retro lancer back together, testing the mechanism before calling Marcus and the rest. "Kids, we got assholes. I managed to make Griffin look like an idiot, but we got Queen's Guard and formers incoming. Get back here with that fuel. Now."

"We're working on it!"

"Work faster." He slammed a magazine into the lancer before entering the fray, cackling as he charged at a Theron, who screamed at seeing him.

* * *

"Queen's Guard are at the building. Ron's… doing his thing."

Marcus huffed. "At the end, I think all the guards'll be dead by the time we get there."

"So long as they don't blow up the fuel, I don't care." Jaden said, as he dropped the second massive cannister of Imulsion fuel into the tram. "Okay, let's get this thing to the other side!" He then paused "On second thought… _Ra Cailum_? Your transporter's working, right?"

"Perfectly. Why?"

"Ron needs a bit of help."

* * *

A Lancer mk 2 was NOT a sword. A crude halberd at best. Yet Ron was using one AS an ax, fighting with a Theron guard and hacking through the Formers like a white-hot knife through air. "Come on, fuckers! Hit me! Fight me! GIVE ME A HUG!"

The Locust (and human) response was… well, unified. "FUCK NO!"

"At least you fucks all agree on SOMETHING!" More Lancer fire impacted the Guards from behind as Marcus and Anya appeared, firing their weapons. "Well, welcome to the fight, kids. Thought I'd have all the fun to myself. How's the gas?"

"Had it beamed back to the ship for safety," Jaden informed as he grabbed a Locust and tossed him over the side of the building. "We came this far for the damn shit, we're not about to lose it in the middle of a fucking firefight!"

"Griffin's upstairs. He doesn't like me very much."

"You're an asshole. Few people like you."

Ron shrugged. "Come on, let's clean house. Then we can get you guys to Endeavour and to that sub. Unless Sonja can hack through the EM around the island."

Beaming in would save them trouble, but the other method was probably safer.

"Got it!" Jaden nodded, raising his rifle towards the incoming Locust. "Come on freakshows! Let's see if any of you got some fucking brains before we blow 'em out your skulls!"

A pair of guards wisely ran away, only to end up near a horde of formers, which were dealt with via a Boomshot grenade from Jace. "Oh yeah, I'm good!"

The tower was finally silent, only the thuds of Ron's mecho-troops echoing throughout as they met up with Griffin. "Tower's clear."

"Clear?! They're fucking dead! Most of my people are fucking gone! We survived everything: the war, the Hammer strikes, the Locust, the glowies! You show up and everything dies! Everywhere you go, nothing but pain, death and miseries! You fucking COG mother—"

Ron punched Griffin in the face before knocking him down and hanging him from his leg, upside down, with the street directly below him.

"Listen to me VERY well, Griffin! You show NO respect, you fight me on everything, you think I'm working for the COG when I'm working WITH them and you accuse us of nothing but death! Ignorant idiots like you don't exist where I'm from! We learn, we study, we UNDERSTAND! I'm tempted to drop you and be done with it! Your stupidity would be a welcome absence from the gene pool! Give me ONE reason not to do it!"

"I doubt he's worth it, Uncle Ron," Larcei remarked. "I say just let him stew in what's left of his empire - when we leave this universe, he can try making it on his own."

"Larcei, you're becoming as vindictive as your mother is in a bad mood."

"Should I take that as a compliment?"

"Depends." He swung Griffin into the cable car, probably breaking a few of his ribs. "And that was just to make me feel better. Get back to your trucks. I'll get my troops back to the Ra Cailum, and you should get ready for beam out the millisecond that thing fires off."

"Understood, Uncle Ron," Larcei replied. "Are the ships ready?"

"Not much for creature comforts, but a few weeks and it'll have what everyone needs. But for now, all we need is gravity, life support and warp drive. And that's done. See you in the air." Ron then disappeared in a shower of light, Marcus looking at his Lancer before reloading the weapon. "Let's go. We've got to get to my father."

* * *

 **Ron the true Fan: Azura, you're getting the fucking of your life.**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Almost done with the Gears of War arc. Next arc after that… well… *clears throat* This-**

 **117Jorn: SPOILERS! *shoots tape over Takeshi's mouth***

 **Ron the True Fan: Nice save. Now, I believe we have a bitch to kill. Any objections?**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Mph, mmph. *shakes head***

 **Ja Ne!**


	30. Chapter 30

**Endeavour Naval Base**

 **2 years after the sinking of Jacinto**

* * *

The Rat Truck ran over the Locust guarding the gate - smashing through them and the gate as they finally came to a stop before the naval base. "Finally! Here at last!" Jaden shouted, hopping out with the others. "Alright, let's find the Sub, get it ready and get this shit over with!"

"Too bad we can't just bomb the damn thing from orbit. Just make this easier."

"Sometimes technology isn't the answer, Jace. Come on, let's get inside, see what our sub looks like. As long as it's in one piece, we should be good." Anya coughed as she got out of the truck, actually vomiting as she fell to her knees. "Fuck! I've been feeling like shit all day. Imulsion exposure?"

Larcei glanced at Anya "I doubt it… " she mused. "Unless…" she glanced at Marus, then back to Anya… before smirking slightly as Anya gulped. "I see what's going on."

"What?"

"You and Lieutenant Stroud were seeing each other." The other Gears didn't show any real surprise. They didn't even care.

"So? Everyone knew. No one cared."

"But she's puking. And it's not because of Imulsion."

Anya's eyes widened. "You're kidding."

"I don't think so. You're pregnant, and seeing as Marcus is the only one you've been sleeping with…"

A cock from a snubnose caught her attention as Marcus pointed his gun at her.

"Stop harassing her, Yamato. If she's pregnant, we'll just let your doc take a look at her AFTER we're done here."

The eldest Yamato shrugged, as the gun wasn't really a threat: Marcus was just trying to shut her up and keep Anya calm.

"Ok. Let's get to the sub. Where is it?" Bullets shot past her head, fired from the direction of the base. "Oh, great, them."

Indeed, more Locust were standing in their way.

"Light 'em up!" Marcus called out, as everyone opened fire.

Little bugs flew out of the buildings, firing at them with modified Gorgon SMGs. "These fucking things are useless. She can't seriously expect to stop us with those."

"No, but she can try to slow us down. Kill them fast, get into the building! We need to find that sub!"

* * *

Many, MANY bullets later, they finally entered the naval pens. Inside them were empty pens and in one case, a MASSIVE serapede. But big bugs were useless against a Spartan in full armor.

That annoyance was dealt with quickly, and they found themselves a sub. Jace was not impressed. "Man! Is that it?" he asked. "I thought we had subs the length of a Thrashball field!"

"But this is just what we need, son," Dizzy countered. "A small one's gonna be a lot easier to sneak into Azura! Y'see, size ain't everything!"

"Yeah, tell that to the people with a klick-long starship in orbit."

"The Ra Cailum might be big and powerful, but there ARE things she can't do. Without Riza at the helm, her turn rate goes down the drain and smaller ships can run circles around her. The main reason she's so good is because of the crew, not the ship."

"Anyway, we're going to need more fuel for the sub. After 15 years, the tank's probably empty."

Dizzy jumped down, checking the sub. "Hull looks good! DAMN good! But the rotor's cracked: useless. And big armored boy's right: tanks are empty. I can work my magic on some of this minor shit."

"Alright then. Everyone split up. Spartan, take your wife and Jace, find us some fuel. Anya, Sam, you're with me. We're dealing with the propellor."

"Right," Larcei replied.

"Right," Jaden said, tapping his combadge once before a fuel tank of Imulsion was beamed right next to him. "Found the Fuel!"

"…"

"You forgot I had the fuel we got from Char beamed back to the ship, didn't you?"

"Good thing Griffin had extra. Alright, then. Let's find the rotor."

"Yeah, ok. Not embarrassed or—"

"Shut up before I call Pinkerton to kick your ass, Spartan."

* * *

In orbit, the crew of the Ra Cailum continued their job, as the ship was finally brought back to spec outside of a shipyard.

But that was not Annette Durand's problem. Her problem was the captain. He was… well, unique. His word on this ship was law, but the crew had so much freedom it wasn't funny. Do your job, I don't care was the word.

And she liked that. A lot.

He was her type of man. A bit on the fat side, but… he was a SEXY sort of fat.

Annette blushed slightly at that thought, not sure WHERE it came from… but then again, it didn't SEEM like Ron was dating anyone…

Hmm….

She entered a turbolift, and it slowly rose up. "What is wrong with the lift?"

"I'm slowing it down." Annette looked behind her, seeing Cassie's hologram glare at her. "I'm here to make sure you understand something. Ron is mine."

"Excuse me?"

"Ron. Is. Mine." She Growled - her image flickering slightly. "When I finally get out of this ship's fucking computers, I WILL show him that I love him. And I want you to understand something. I know him. You? You've got nothing."

Annette's eyes narrowed slightly. "If he loved you, he would've said something by now," She growled, her psionics flaring.

"You don't know him. The way he shows affection isn't typical. He treats Sonja like a sister, but he yells at her when she fucks up. He's hard, but fair."

"What I see is a computer trying to be human."

"You know, I DO have control of this lift. I can always shut off the inertial dampeners. I'd like to see you survive gravity crushing you."

The doors opened as the pair seemed ready to fight, revealing Sonja, who looked between the pair. "Am I interrupting something?"

"No."

"Well, mind if I take the lift up to—" The doors closed before the lift moved on. "HEY!"

"He's mine, you computerized bitch." Annette growled.

"MINE!" Cassie shouted as she forced the Turbolift up - before it suddenly ground to a halt as Annette's psionics flared up, as it went back down.

"MINE!"

"MINE!"

"MINE!"

* * *

Ron blinked "Sonja?"

"... _Captain?_ "

"Why is the Turbolift acting like it's in a tug-of-war?"

" _It… might have to do with Cassie and Annette..._ "

"The fuck are they doing? Computer, initiate AI override, authorization Pinkerton Zeta Omega four-seven-nine-Echo."

" _AI control overriden._ "

"Redirect malfunctioning turbolift to main bridge."

Screaming was heard from the lift as Annette was thrown out, Cassie's hologram smiling in victory. "What in the fuck are you two doing?" Both froze as Ron approached. "You two should know better. You will cause damage to the lift with those psionics, and you... Cassie, you've been odd for two years."

"Ron—"

"No excuses. Ladies, whatever problems you have, shelve them. Now. We have bigger problems."

"Three hours holodeck time says they were fighting over him," an enlisted crewman whispered to the person at the station next to them.

"Kim, your findings."

"We're picking up a contact on long range sensors."

"Why didn't I see this?"

"You were distracted. Go on, Commander."

Kim pulled up sensor data. "The energy signature is a match for an Iconian _Iaidon_ -Class dreadnought. With a full Elachi/Cylon carrier group."

"The bitch is back. And because we have to be in low orbit for the countermeasure, we're at a tactical disadvantage."

Takeshi groaned. "Jeez, talk about bad timing…" he muttered.

"Get in contact with the ground team. We need to risk orbital bombardment at Azura to clear out the Maelstrom device and to activate the device."

"I can't get in touch, sir: we've got comms trouble on the ground."

"For fuck's sake. Prep my Widow. I'm going down there to knock out the device."

* * *

"I… fucking… _HATE_ those things!" Jaden growled as the Adamant succeeded in evading the Leviathan - making their final approach to Azura.

"That's it. Welcome to Azura."

"You know, Marcus, you're dad's gonna be happy to see you again."

"If he's still ali—"

A cloud of red entered their view, interrupting Marcus and making Larcei blanch. "Tell me I'm seeing things."

A body slammed into Marcus turret. "I wish you were."

"Fucking bastards! They killed the civies!"

The bodies cleared up, much to their disgust, as they reached the surface.

"Prescott shipped people out here? Nice of him to tell us."

"Let's be honest: he was an asshole, but he stuck with us until Jacinto collapsed into the Hollow. I'll give him credit for that."

The Submarine surfaced as it docked with the small port within the cavern. The turrets retracting, allowing for the Gears and others to step out. "Dizzy, take her down," Marcus said. "If shit hits the fan, that sub might be our only ticket out of here."

" _Aye aye, Marcus,_ " Dizzy said, before the _Adamant_ slowly dived back beneath the water.

The PA chimed. "Welcome to Azura. You have been chosen for protection due to your contributions to society."

"Protection?! What the hell?"

"Screw it. Let's just find my father, activate his weapon and get out of here."

Static erupted from their radios a moment later. "Pink-to Delta! Respo-Rep-t-Pinkerton-Delt-respond! We-"

"Captain, this is Anya Stroud! We barely read you."

"Fucking EM-comms-onian fleet-get fuc-ing!"

"Maelstrom's fucking with the radio, and we don't have a proper subspace transmitter that'll cut through. What do you think he's trying to tell us?"

"All I could pick up was EM's messing with coms and… something about an Onion?"

Jaden rose his brow, "Either way, whatever it is we should haul our asses. If Ron's trying to contact us, it's always bad news."

* * *

Adam Fenix was not the best father. He loved his son deeply, but he sucked at SHOWING it and he knew it. But this had to be his greatest gift to his child.

Actually, it was a gift from BOTH his parents.

His wife told him about a process that involved using radiation to kill viruses, and he took that inspiration to create the Countermeasure. Myrrah ruined that for him, as well as the War with the UIR taking up all his time. He could've ended the war before it started.

"Anya to Cole! Cole, do you read me?"

Oh, this was good. Adam activated the radio, contacting the other COG-issue comm. "Anya? Anya, is that you? THis is Adam Fenix! Can you hear me?"

"Professor! Yes, we hear you!"

"Oh, thank God, Prescott found you! Can you see the security camera?"

Anya entered the screen's line of sight. "Yes, I can."

Another female figure entered the screen as well. "Professor Fenix, my name is Larcei Yamato, and I'm from the United Federation of Planets - did Prescott tell you about us?"

"Yes, to a lesser degree. I wonder how you got here, or why you're bothering to help us—"

"It's what we do, Professor. We know you've got a countermeasure to the Imulsion. Can you get us to the Maelstrom, that way we can shut it off and get reinforcements to land, that way you can activate it?"

"There's a train that—"

"Yeah, tunnel's blocked, Prof."

"Before I let you go anywhere, I want to know if Marcus is there."

His son then entered view, a scar on his face. Prescott promised him that Marcus would not be harmed outside of combat. Then again, the slab's prison keepers didn't get the memo. "Hey, dad."

"It's good to see you, Marcus. Is Dom with you? And may I ask how you got that scar?"

"Later, dad. Can you shut down the Maelstrom?"

"Not from here. But I do have access to the security system. I can open the maintenance tunnel for you."

"Do it. We'll get you out of there. I promise."

Adam got to work before a static filled call entered the channel. "This is Captain Ronald Pinkerton! Delta Squad, please come in—FUCK! I hate lightning!"

"Captain Pinkerton, this is Adam Fenix," Adam said. "Prescott told me a couple things about you. I'm in contact with Delta squad now. What's the situation?"

"Relay this to Delta, EXACTLY, Professor: The Iconians are here, with two complete carrier battle groups! They are 30 lightminutes out, and T'ket is probably still pissed at us! We need to deactivate the Maelstrom and activate the countermeasure NOW. Relay your coordinates to me, Professor, that way I can get you out as soon as the EM clears—" A loud snap was heard as the comm cut out for a second. " _Whoever built that thing needs to be shot_!"

Adam relayed the message to Delta even as he sent Ron his coordinates.

"Dammit!" Larcei shouted. "OK, we need to double, no, triple-time it, guys! We have to get that countermeasure fired off and get out of here before the Iconians get to us!"

"Who are the Iconians?"

"Let's just say you don't want to meet them, Professor! Though knowing our luck, you will!"

He got back on the link with Ron. "Captain, where are you? Even the strongest comms can't get through the Maelstrom."

" _I'm in an alien fighter inside the hurricane! And loathing every second of it! Seriously, your weather control technology sucks_!"

Adam smiled. He always hated that thing. "I think I can direct you to the eye of the storm, Captain. If you can get one shot at the generator—"

" _I get the idea and I like it; consider it a backup if Delta can't shut it off_!"

" _Sounds good!_ " Jaden said, " _We'll double-time it! We need to administer the Lambent countermeasure ASAP and then GTFO before T'ket rips us all to shreds!_ "

"Who's T'ket?"

"NO one you want to meet!"

* * *

Marcus had had one hell of a day. First, his longtime lover is revealed to be pregnant, then he finally speaks to his father for the first time in over 5 years, and now the Ra Cailum's enemy was hunting them down.

"What the fuck did you do to piss off this T'ket person?"

"Riza cut off her arm, my father and uncle killed her sister. She's gone insane from the loss of her homeworld 200000 years ago - long story - and blames my uncle for everything. Which is sort of right, seeing as they went back in time to kill the Iconians, but ended up saving them."

Sam actually stopped. "Wait, TIME TRAVEL? You can do that?" Jaden stopped, shrugging. "I stopped questioning what they could do a long time ago. Long and short of it is, we need to hurry."

"Pinkerton to Delta! Finally! Cleared the storm wall! Call for airstrikes; I'll provide what I can!"

"About fucking time!" Jaden shouted, "I sure as hell hope those colony ships are ready, because we'll need to hightail it out of here once the countermeasure is deployed!"

"Won't be comfortable, but it's better than Sera!" The Locust fired upwards, but Ron's Widow fired a tetryon beam at the ground forces, vaporizing them. "Humans are back, fuckers! Get to the generator! Baird's en route with some friends!"

Delta Roadie-ran to the massive building, allowing Ron to cover their asses until they entered the building, where they cleared house. "Dad, we're inside the Maelstrom generator!" "There's, one, two, three generators! Shut them down and the Maelstrom will deactivate."

"That's a negative, Prof: detecting a large power source backing up those generators. That won't work!"

Adam cursed, as did Delta. "Cut the coolant! It'll overheat and explode!"

"Professor, I want you out of my head! You're making me like you! You heard him, Delta!"

"You heard the man!" Jaden shouted, pulling out several satchel charges. "Set these up, and we'll blow the whole thing to smithereens!"

A Brumak, struggling against the storm, entered sight, firing its' machine guns at them, but it received a tetryon beam to the face, decapitating it. " _Get inside, people_!"

"Working on it, Captain! Not exactly easy, with or without your help!"

" _I know! Try flying a fighter in this shit_!"

"I'll pass, Uncle Ron!" Larcei called out. "Tou-san might be able to, heck, Aunt Riza might be able to though she'd trash the fighter in the process, but I doubt I could!"

" _That was rhetorical!_ " The Widow was pushed upwards, as the wind shoved it away. " _I hate wind shear!_ "

The ground team didn't have a response to this, as they made their way into the Maelstrom Generator.

"There are five cooling valves! Turn them and you'll have three minutes to get out before the heat cooks everything in there."

"That's scary."

"The Ra Cailum's warp nacelles have a dual purpose, so that makes sense: they radiate heat from the warp plasma away from the ship and form the ship's warp bubble."

"While here, the heat's used to help power the Maelstrom. Not how Starfleet does it?"

Larcei shrugged. "Usually, we don't make hurricanes."

Hissing was heard as they bypassed the generators before a kantus wearing bulletproof armor approached, holding twin Gorgons.

"Oh great," Larcei remarked. "The Locust are learning. Aim for the weak points, I guess?"

"We have grenades! Stick them and it'll explode!" The Kantus screeched before rolling towards them, like the hedgehog from hell. "Oh, shit!"

"That's new!" Marcus dodged the armored kantus and stuck a bolo grenade to it. It rapidly beeped seconds later, the Kantus screaming before it exploded.

"That was nice of it to die."

"Not nice enough. Let's move."

The group nodded, and started moving again. They soon reached the first valve, and Jaden pulled it out, turned it, and put it back in place, shutting off the coolant from that valve.

"Boom!"

"Fucking boomers! Keep to cover; they can't hit you!" A grappling hook sunk into place near Larcei's head. "Want to bet? We've got Theron guards climbing up!"

Marcus activated his chainsaw, hacking the hook apart, making the guard fall to his death. "Don't stop! Take out those boomers and get to the next valve!"

A guard climbed up, but Anya chainsawed its' head off with her lancer, taking its' retro lancer and firing both weapons akimbo at a squad of drones that managed to get up to the catwalks.

"Remind me never to make her mad!"

"It's the hormones; they're influencing her mood!"

They ran through boomers and Therons, gunning and chainsawing them down as they went, before they hit the next valve, Jaden turning it off again. "Three more to go!"

Another armored kantus rolled in, literally, but a boomshot round swiftly killed it. "NO!"

"What do you know, Boomers ARE fucking stupid. He killed his own guy!"

Marcus grabbed the third valve as soon as he reached it, lifting it out and twisting it before pushing it in. "That's three!"

Snarling was heard before bloodmounts rushed in. "Damn it, bloodmounts!"

Jaden walked up to the beast before punching its' rider off the mount, then kicking it in the head and shooting the rider.

"Next, please."

Larcei shot another Boomer in the head, before getting the fourth valve. "One more to go!"

* * *

Garron Paduk did not want to be here. After the destruction of Halvo Bay, he had split up from Kilo Squad, leading the people in the ruins. Then Baird returned, saying he needed help 'ending the war'. The two Carmines he brought with him confirmed it, as Garron had looked into the sky a few times, seeing a massive form in the skies.

The Gorasni called it 'The end-bringer' in his native tongue. He was more then right as that strange fighter flew overhead.

Which was why, against his better judgement, he had joined Baird's suicide mission.

Besides, this 'Azura' seemed to be a nice place.

"A fucking hurricane. Baird, are you trying to get us killed?"

"Look, Garron, the hurricane's artificial. Perfect way to hide it in plain sight."

"Oh, SURE, as if the COG has such tech..."

The storm began to fade, dark storm clouds fading away. "...nology, ok, I take it back."

"Your apology is welcome." Snark to snark warfare was a specialty of the pair, as they boarded Paduk's KR as it took off, now carrying a repaired and upgraded JACK. " _Bloody hell, they found the UIR! That's a Gorasni ship_!"

Cole whooped as the KR passed over the smaller islands. "Yeah, we're having a reunion with our Indie friends, baby! WOOOOOO!"

The helicopter flew towards, then set down near Delta's location, the group getting out, Baird activating JACK on the way out.

"Good to see you guys," Larcei said."Who's the guy in green?"

Garron, wearing his old COG/UIR armor, shrugged. "Garron Paduk, formerly of the Union of Independent Republics. And you—"

"Are married, so keep away."

"Hey…" Baird chose that moment to speak up, noticing something. "Where's Dom and Dizzy?"

"Dizzy's taken the submarine offshore," Marcus explained. "Dom… Dom's in critical condition on the Ra Cailum, and if they weren't here, I doubt he'd have made it."

Paduk didn't know a Dom.

"Fuck."

"Tell me these grubs are gonna fucking pay, Marcus!"

"He got us this far. Let's finish the job he started." He looked at Paduk. "Welcome to Delta."

"You're Marcus Fenix. I think I had people trying to kill you in Aspho Fields. Good to see the COG had a quality soldier there."

"You were there?"

Paduk laughed as Delta walked on the path. "No, but I put in several security measures before I was transferred. Must be quite the badass to have gotten out of there and this entire war in one piece."

Marcus gave a bit of a grim chuckle. "That, or a healthy dose of luck," he remarked.

The strange fighter flew overhead again, firing beams of light at the Locust. "EM's finally clearing up, but it'll take a few minutes before we can beam you to the countermeasure. Same with Professor Fenix. Cover the landing forces."

"Ra Cailum _to all forces: Iconian ships are closing in! Get that countermeasure activated, kill the Lambent and do it quickly!_ "

"We copy, Commander, but unless you can get through the EM crap sooner, we gotta walk."

" _Oh, fuck it. Corpsa, fire phasers at enemy ground positions_!"

Paduk looked at Baird. "Phasers?"

"Think Hammer, but worse."

And indeed, massive lances of orange energy speared down from the heavens, incinerating Locust positions.

"Who the hell are these people?"

"Starfleet."

* * *

Myrrah watched the lance of death destroy several chokepoints, allowing Marcus to get on with the job. "You will not succeed, Marcus Fenix!"

"Hey, bitch!" A blue beam impacted the Tempest as Ron's widow swung in. "I think it's time we had that talk!"

The Tempest fired its' thermal beam at the Widow, but all that did was allow Ron to fire a tetryon beam down its' throat.

"Like the taste of that, bitch?!"

The Tempest did _not_ like the taste of that, and in fact was suffering pretty badly as it began to struggle against gravity.

"Damn you, Pinkerton!"

"Damn yourself, you bitch."

"Humans are an inferior species! The Locust will rise and take over this world!"

" _Then you can_ have _it. But before you do… look in a mirror_."

The Tempest crashed into the ground, Myrrah thrown clear, but slamming into a pole before a pane of glass surrounding the hotel came down on her.

She had just a few seconds to see her reflection - her _human_ reflection - before it split her clean in two.

For all her ranting, all her raging against humanity...

She was one of them.

She was nothing but a hypocrite. Those were the last thoughts of the Locust Queen, the misplaced human.

The human monster.

* * *

Marcus chuckled as he saw Myrrah go down. "Serves you right, you bitch." Black voids soon opened up, and several machines marched out of them.

"Fuck! Cylon Centurions!"

The 'Cylons' deployed their machine guns and opened fire on the Gears, who all took cover. "What in the hell are those things?!"

"Humanoid robots we ran into a few stops ago!" Larcei yelled back. "Long story, but the short version is I was three years old when they kidnapped me and I was sent across universes separate from the Ra Cailum, and when Uncle Ron, Tou-san, and Jaden found me again, I was 21!"

Paduk looked to Baird and Marcus (mostly Baird) for answers, and they simply shrugged. "They get weirder shit then we ever did. How bulletproof are they?"

"Not very, if you use HVTs!"

Marcus raised his Lancer, firing it at the Centurions, managing to kill one using the HV-tracers that were standard issue for COG weapons and destroying another's machine guns.

It deployed its' talons in response. Marcus jumped out of cover, firing up the chainsaw and swinging it into the Centurion.

The chainsaw tore into the metal frame of the Centurion, sparks and metal flying everywhere as he sawed it in half.

"Come on, keep moving!" Larcei yelled. "I want to get this countermeasure deployed before we get swarmed!"

More aliens came out of the gateways, including mutons, sectoids and floaters, as well as a few modified berserkers. "Shit! Uncle, a little help?!"

Blue bolts impacted the ground where the XCOM foes appeared, roasting most of them. "GO!"

Delta didn't need much more urging, but when the Locust poured out in force to fight the aliens, Delta broke through and got inside.

"At least the grubs are fighting the new ones, yes?"

"Yeah, until the shit hits the fan again."

"Ah, it always does, Baird. It's just like old times. At least Loumis isn't putting us on trial again!"

"Wait, what?" Larcei asked.

"Long story, young one. We'll tell you it over some drinks on your fancy spaceship!"

"Starship."

The building rocked as the team were halted by a LARGER gateway. And out of it came Larcei's worst nightmare.

"At long last, I have found the Other's loved ones. Now they will burn as my world did!"

"Oh, shit. RUN! Do NOT fight her!"

As they did that, Baird yelled, "So who's tall, dark red, and nasty back there?"

" ** _THAT_** , Baird, is an Iconian!" Larcei yelled back. "Specifically a very nasty one who holds a bit of a grudge against Uncle Ron, Tou-san, and our respective families!"

"The fuck did you people do?!"

"Hey, I wasn't even THERE for their little war!"

A gateway opened in front of them, spewing out matter straight from a star. "THe fuck is that shit?!"

"Ron, we need a beam up to the countermeasure! NOW!"

"I'm trying! Hang on, I'll try to get the whore's attention!" A tetryon bolt came into the building, impacting T'ket.

"OTHER!"

"Hi, kety! Want to dance?!"

The Iconian began drawing more energy before the team was beamed out, ending up five feet above the roof of the hotel.

"FUCK!"

" _Sorry, T'ket's pissed off! Couldn't be any more accurate!_ "

"It's fine!" Larcei called back. "OK, so, how does this thing work?"

Another shower of light appeared, dropping Adam Fenix on his ass, though his fall was three feet. "Damn! What was that?"

Marcus approached his father. "Dad."

"Hello, Marcus. I… I'm sorry. There's so much I have to tell you—"

"Later, dad, when we're all safe. We'll have all the time in the world. Your weapon, how's it work?"

Adam laughed. "Oh, I can't take the credit. I created the technology, but your mother created the concept. It's like a neutron bomb, designed to kill lambent cells."

Baird shuddered. "Yeah, we saw what happened. Lambent humans attacked us in Halvo Bay."

"And Mercy and Char. And here, from the sound."

Baird waved all that off. "Are WE going to be affected?"

"Unless you're feeling tingling in your extremities, you'll be fine…?"

"Corporal Damon Baird."

"Ah, Yes, Prescott told me about you. I could use your help in powering up the device. It needs to be activated in stages."

More gateways appeared, sending out hordes of XCOM aliens and Cylon Centurions. "We're going to need more guns. Larcei, call your dad! We need those fancy phasers of yours!"

Larcei nodded, tapping her commbadge. "Tou-san, it's Larcei. We're ready to deploy the countermeasure, but we need more guns, and possibly bigger guns, to hold off Iconian ground troops!"

" _They're on the way, Larcei!_ " Takeshi replied, before a few MACO teams beamed down, along with a half dozen Ronopods.

"I wish I had the time to learn how you do that."

"You'll have it, Professor! Activate the machine!"

A Centurion rushed at Anya, who activated her chainsaw and hacked the machine's head off, sending it to the ground. Sam and Baird tag-teamed a muton with some help from a MACO, Marcus…

Well, Marcus pulled a Ron and went on a fucking RAMPAGE.

Sectoids attempted to mind control him, but all they felt was rage. Searing, blinding rage as he introduced the tiny ones to his chainsaw. "FUCKING DIE! YOU HEAR ME?! DIE!"

A berserker charged at him, but Marcus actually punched it in the face before slowly hacking it apart with the Lancer, limb by limb. It tried to escape, but she was introduced to the Lancer's chainsaw via her neck.

"...You know, he'd make a damn good Spartan," Jaden mused as he strangled a Muton.

"Want to see if he'd submit to the augmentations?"

"On the _Ra Cailum_ , that's a cold day in hell. Your uncle disapproved of ONI's crap."

Understatement, but it was true. "The generators are cycling! We'll be able to fire in two minutes!" A Centurion was next to suffer Marcus' wrath, as he literally pulled the robot's arms out of its' sockets, followed shortly by its' head. "Fuck, Marcus, what the hell happened to you?!"

"Dom nearly died and these assholes are trying to kill his father!"

The Iconian forces began retreating through gateways, shortly before Sam found something on ground level. "Hey! They're capturing the Locust! Shootin' them with some laser beams and throwing them through those.. .the hell are those?"

"Gateways. Think the transporter, but more advanced. It would take a miracle for anyone to understand—"

The tower shook once more, followed by Ron's Widow flying out. "T'ket's gone! Bad news is, the fleet's here!"

"Then we need to get going ASAP," Larcei remarked, before shouting, "Baird! Professor! How's it coming?"

"It's about to activate! Hold on!" The machine fired out a pulse, and Lambent stalks and troops began collapsing in pain. "It's starting."

Marcus rushed over towards his father, who was exiting the building. "We need to go, dad, the tower's too unstable."

"I'm not going to make it, Marcus."

Marcus dropped his Lancer to the ground, which one of the MACOs grabbed. "It's ok, I'll carry you!"

"Marcus, the only way I could see if this worked was to test this on myself, then infect myself with the Imulsion! I FORCED it to grow!"

The machine pulsed again, and his veins glowed yellow. "Oh, SHIT!"

"NO! You are NOT going to die!"

Larcei just looked on, not willing to say anything to interrupt what was obviously Adam's final farewell to his son.

"I'm glad I got to see you again, Marcus."

"Goddamn it, I want my child to know his grandfather!" Adam smiled sadly. "Go. And live. Please. For me." The countermeasure fired one more time, and Adam Jonathon Fenix crumbled into dust, his cog tags landing in Marcus' hands just before light caught them. "NO!"

The building fell apart, the countermeasure firing one last time, killing the Imulsion on Sera and everything infected by it.

* * *

"At least it's over. _Ra Cailum_ , I'm coming in hot! Status on the wormhole drive and evacuation!"

" _Evac is proceeding: all COG and UIR forces along with Designated Stranded are beaming to the colony ships and warp drive is online and synced. We're ready to leave_."

" _Ground team is aboard, Boss!_ " Takeshi called out. " _Just waiting on you before we Get the Frak Outta Dodge!_ "

Iconian ships approached the fleet, and Ron swung in on a wide arc towards his flagship.

Adama was highest ranking fleet officer, and Roslin had Colonial government control, but they deferred to Ron, just like the rest of the fleet captains.

"I'm coming in on full impulse! Get ready for a pancake!" 'Pancake' was old Earth naval aviation terminology for 'an extremely hard landing'. And Ron was going in at full impulse.

So it was going to be a _burnt_ pancake.

The Widow entered the main shuttlebay, sparking on the floor before the hatch closed. "I'm on board! Warp speed!"

* * *

"You heard the man, Riza! Warp speed!"

The Iconian fleet approached, however the combined multi-universal fleet moved faster as they sped away from Sera at maximum speed. Moments later, the familiar sight of a wormhole opened before the fleet - and moments later… they vanished into the void between universes, leaving behind the Iconian fleet… and one pissed off Iconian bitch.

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: FINALLY It's DONE!**

 **117Jorn: Good, now we can get on to- *door rattles* Oh shit, she's back…**

 **Takeshi: Who?**

 **117Jorn: Hang on… *Approaches door as he releases some of the locks, and opening it up by a crack* Look, you'll come in NEXT CHAPTER. We don't want to spoil things for the readers!**

 **?: Come Ooooooon! We've been waiting for this like forever!**

 **Ron the True Fan: You ain't the only ones!**

 **117Jorn: Come on, you and the others just need to be patient!**

 **?: But we want to be in it NOW! *Silver puppy eyes could be seen in the shadows*.**

 **117Jorn: *Sighs as he opens the door* Look, if you leave right now - I'll give you a whole pack of homemade cookies. (Ron: Plus strawberries!)**

 **?: … Cookies? *Figure's head perks up like a dog being promised a treat***

 **117Jorn: *Smirks as he grabs a pack of Strawberry cookies* Want the Cookies… Go get e'm! *thows Cookiees down the hall***

 **?: COOKIEEES! *Flash of red and rose pellets are left in figure's wake*.**

 **117Jorn: *Sighs* Okay, that should hold her over for about a week. We need to get working ASAP before she comes back!**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Yeah… Though I think I fear her sister whenever someone messes with her -*Tape slaps over Takeshi's mouth* MMMMMPH!**

 **117Jorn: SPOILERS!**

 **Ron the True Fan: Fuck me, this is probably the longest Author's Note we've ever made. Kinda fitting, seeing as this will be the longest arc in the fic as of yet. (Waits for tape) Huh, no spoiler tape. Mostly because I'm not revealing story intel, probably.**

 **117Jorn: I've got my eye on you *points spoiler gun at Ron***

 **Ron the True Fan: I'm not saying shit about the next arc beyond length. Either way, boys, enjoy the fic: this Chapter was finished October 26th, 2016.**

 **Ja Ne!**

 **Takeshi Yamato: *Muffled Goodbye***


	31. Chapter 31

**USS _Ra Cailum_**

 **Location and time: Unknown**

* * *

Ron had decided to take stock of the situation before going to the bridge. So many dead and wounded. Dominic Santiago, one of the Locust war's greatest heroes, was near-death, but Rutia was working on making him well again.

Hoffman and Trescu wanted to see him, too, but he thought he would talk with Mami and her friends, whom he had been neglecting for the last ten months.

As such, he was walking into the Miki/Sakura quarters, though he was going to regret it in a second.

"Ladies—SWEET CHRIST!"

Apparently, his curse was STILL nice and strong, as Sayaka and Kyoko were in a state of partial undress. And making out.

Better question, when the hell did they start dating?!

"C-Captain! What the hell?!"

"I was going-" He began to say, before suddenly the blunt end of Kyoko's spear hit him square in the jaw, and suddenly he went flying back down the hall, before coming to a rolling stop.

"God-fucking-damn it, woman, it's not like I barged in."

"Looks like it from our position, Cap!"

Ron got back up, rubbing his jaw as he walked back in. "I rang the door chime _twice_. I presumed from the unlocked door I was being welcomed in."

Sayaka, getting her blouse back on, checked the door. "Son of a—he's right, it is unlocked. I remember locking it!"

Kyoko groaned. "Fuck. Sorry, Cap."

"It's fine. I thought I'd check up on you girls. I've been… well, I haven't checked up on you."

Sayaka shrugged. "You've been depressed. It's not your fault. I mean, you've had nothing to do but think about all the people back on Sera."

"Thank you, Chief, for the depression."

The bluenette nervously chuckled. "Well—wait, what?"

"I'm giving you girls all non-commissioned ranks in lieu of the situation. It'll keep you busy. Keep… doing what you were doing, I'm going to go talk to Homura and Madoka." He stepped out of the room, closing the door.

"Whoever keeps doing this will PAY."

* * *

Homura Akemi was, by her core nature, shy.

She was a cold, hard badass when she knew what she was doing. But with Madoka on this ship and no Witches to fight...

She was reverting.

She was turning back into that pathetic little girl.

"Homura, are you ok?"

The ravenette looked at her pink-haired friend. "It's… I—"

"Homura, we've known each other for three years." Madoka turned to face Homura, who was flinching. Ever since the Elachi had boarded, Madoka had become MUCH more forceful. "Tell me what's wrong."

"Madoka… I… Do you remember that night before we found Larcei? Where we… spent the night?"

"Yes. I remember that."

The moment of truth was here. "When we… fell asleep, I said… I said that I loved you."

Madoka smiled. "I do remember that, even if a bit vaguely due to how sleepy I was," she said. "But I was still conscious enough to reply… did you hear it?"

Homura's heart began to thunder in her chest. She wasn't dreaming that night?

"I… I thought I was dreaming. That it was just—"

Madoka shut her up by pressing her lips to Homura's. All of Homura's wildest dreams had come true. In one timeline, she had locked Madoka up for almost the entire two months in a cell. She was rather… insane back then.

But now? Now was a dream she never wanted to awaken from.

After a moment, their lips parted. "I love you, Homura," Madoka said. "And I know… I know that all you did, you did for me, so… thank you…"

The doors opened before they could act on any further… carnal thoughts as Ron entered the room. "Oh, thank fuck, at least I walked in BEFORE you two took off your clothes."

Most people would take that as a sign of perverted intent. But after three years, they knew Ron walked in on couples in the act, so to speak, unwillingly, so they knew he was happy to not get a kick to the face.

"Captain. Is there something you want?"

"Just checking in on you girls. Been a hard two years on everyone, emotionally and otherwise."

"Not really something that can be argued," Madoka remarked. "We're doing alright, though, right, Homura?"

"Yes. Captain, I know you planned on allowing us in on more operations—"

"Mami made the request on her part, though she hinted the rest of you wanted to get off the ship once in a while."

Madoka nodded. "Captain, I found this a few years ago." She held up her dull soul gem, prompting Homura to pale before Ron's eye twitched.

And right before he yelled one letter.

"Q!"

There was a bright flash of light, before a voice called out, "You ra—oh. You."

Ron's head turned towards Q. And Homura was introduced to a god getting his ass handed to him by a man.

"I OWE YOU FOR THE SHIT YOU PULLED LAST TIME!"

"NOT THE FACE!"

Madoka turned to Homura. "Is the captain beating up a man who just appeared out of a flash of light?" she asked.

Homura nodded, dumbly.

"Good. I'm not hallucinating, then."

Ron had somehow gotten a Lancer, and fired up the chainsaw. "Prepare to die."

"You can't kill me!"

"I can make you wish I could."

Homura had heard from Commander Yamato that you could not predict Ron, except in two ways: that you couldn't know what he was doing next and if he wanted revenge, it would be slow and painful. And painful it was, for Q.

"What did he do?"

"You do not want to know."

Madoka considered for a moment, and then asked, "Captain, do you think you and he can take this out of our quarters? And lock the door behind you?"

Ron grabbed Q and threw him out.

"Fuck your brains out all you like, just remember, I DO expect you on duty in 18 hours."

The door shut, and Q's screams were heard outside until they faded into the distance.

"I keep forgetting how BIG this ship is."

"Yeah," Madoka replied, before she smiled tenderly at Homura. "Now… where were we before the Captain interrupted us…?"

* * *

Marcus walked into sickbay, finding Dom on one of the fancy biobeds. His skin was patchy, and had a mask on his face. "How is he?"

"He suffered third-degree burns all over his body. He's lucky that we're here, or he'd've died from Imulsion exposure AND the burns. Question is, is he going to be happy that he's alive?"

Marcus wanted to say yes. But with Maria's death and his seemingly suicidal run at the tank...

There just wasn't a way to tell for sure.

Still, Marcus would do his best to help Dom however he could. He'd need the help of his best friend in the days, weeks, and years to come… and his unborn child would need a godfather.

Speaking of which… "How did Anya's checkup go?"

"Five weeks pregnant, and a healthy baby. Imulsion exposure didn't do any damage, and the baby SHOULD be born within the next seven to eight months."

"Seven?"

"Nine months from conception to birth is just the average. According to the boss, Riza's time in the womb was over 11 months. She just didn't want to get out!"

Marcus huffed in amusement. "Nice."

"Dom's going to be fine. A couple of weeks in physical recovery and he'll be on his feet. Skin'll be tender for a while, but nothing I can do about that shit."

Marcus watched as Rutia injected Dom with something from a hypo. "I thought doctors were compassionate people."

"Oh, I got compassion. I'm just not a fucking bleeding heart. There's a difference."

Marcus nodded at that. "Well, keep it up, doc," he said. "And thanks."

"Sure. Head up to the bridge: I think the captain's going to call a meeting. They always do that whenever we jump, and you're the ranking Gear NCO. I'll finish up here and see you up there."

Marcus left sickbay, running into the rest of Delta. "Yo, Marcus, how's Dom?"

"In the shit up to his head, but he'll be fine."

"Marcus, when a man loses the lady he loves, he ain't gonna be ok! I mean, when I joined the army, I left the game behind. Still regret it."

"It's not the same, Cole."

"I know, but he's not gonna be ok overnight! He's gonna be fucked in the head for a while!"

"Then we're gonna have to help him," Marcus told them. "Be there for him, do what it takes to make sure he stays alright."

" _All senior staff and personnel, report to the deck one conference room. Repeat, all senior staff plus Colonel Hoffman, Commander Trescu, Sergeant Fenix and Lieutenant Stroud report to the deck one conference room._ "

"Well, shit, looks like I'm still important. I'll tell you how it goes."

"Right - good luck up there, Marcus," Baird said.

* * *

"While I know I have no real say in how you reorganize the COG, I will refer to both Colonel Hoffman and Commander Trescu regarding the COG's citizenry."

"We remember your kindness, Captain, when we were at Vectes. I would believe that you are the best man to remake the COG, better than it was."

Ron sighed. "Very well. I'd like to model it off the old United States, with each former country being a state, answering to a single leader and a senate below them representing each country. Or what's left of them. Takeshi, how many Serans are left from the wars with the Locust and the Lambent?"

Takeshi sighed. "A fair bit less than we could have hoped for," he admitted. "We have 4000 Gorasni, about 3100 Stranded, about 10000 ordinary civilians, and 4700 COG soldiers.

"Barely enough to count as a township. Fuck me, we left too many people behind."

"We left less than 9000 people behind, and most of them were suffering from heavy Imulsion poisoning. They're probably dead, now."

"They shouldn't be."

Marcus groaned, facepalming. "Captain, you got SERIOUS messiah complex problems."

"Not a messiah complex. When we're trained at Starfleet Academy, Sergeant, we're told to save as many people as possible. Now, I don't have a problem ordering someone to do something dangerous that might result in death. They're Starfleet; they accept danger. Civilians, I have a problem with losing. They don't deserve to be on the front line of a war, and THAT is why I'm depressed."

Takeshi sighed. "Not much we can do about it, though," he remarked. "We saved as many people as **_wanted_** to be saved, Boss - those people who stayed weren't going to leave, come hell or high water."

"Doesn't make me feel better."

Adama leaned forward, coughing into his hand. "What now, Captain?"

"Very good question, sir. Kim, Cassie, local situation, please."

"Patching data in now, captain." On the big screen, a solar system was displayed. "A typical 6 planet system, one planet in the habitable zone. And there's signs of life on it."

"Zoom in on that planet," Takeshi said. The screen did so. "Huh. Never seen a broken moon quite like that before." Indeed, it looked like the moon in question had only a crescent's worth intact, and the rest of it was in large chunks.

"40% of the moon is in asteroidal fragments, kept in place by gravity."

"Any chance this was done naturally?"

"No, sir. It was done artificially, from the looks, by a ground-based weapon."

Ron leaned back in his chair, seemingly frightened. "Shit. Cracking a moon like that would take a full three ten-shot volleys of photon torpedoes."

"Yeah," Takeshi replied. "Well, we need to ascertain the local situation at the very least, but we should be very careful about it."

"All ships will be under the cloak at all times. Phase shifted, as well."

"Captain, I think I speak for everyone when I say that we need to get off these ships once in a while. We can't stick to the gray of metal and the holodecks can only do so much."

"Madam President, we've had two universes in a row with hostile life. Until the situation is clarified, no one leaves the ships. Period."

"We might need boots on the ground to explore the situation in the first place, Boss," Sonja remarked.

"We'll send a recon force when we get in orbit. Until we get answers, no one goes down there. And if anyone does, we maintain the Prime Directive. If anyone's still alive, we don't tell them who we are."

Marcus groaned. The Prime Directive was pointless. Prevent contaminating a culture? What was the point of it?

So what if people knew about people from space? All it would do was help them.

Takeshi caught the groan, and Marcus' thought processes. "Marcus, imagine if you will a planet that has not made it to space travel, let alone FTL, yet, and whose people are stuck on the ground, but just living ordinary happy lives - no Locust or Lambent crap to deal with. Now, imagine that they suddenly learn that there is other life in the universe or multiverse, and that said life is currently in orbit. What do you think the reaction of the populace is going to be? Or, imagine a scenario where two or more factions in a planetary war come across weapons technology beyond anything that planet has encountered before. Do you think they are going to use it? Eliminate their enemies once and for all, with no concerns to the environmental fallout?"

And that was something he didn't think about. "Yeah, good point."

"This is why Starfleet officers must obey the Prime Directive. Culture, lifestyles, everything must be kept as free from contamination as possible. We destroyed hundreds of civilizations on Earth before we came up with the idea that we should not do anything to cause damage to other civilizations. Yes, we should help. But we shouldn't destroy their civilization by showing up and revealing ourselves."

Luna looked back at Delta's reps. "Sadly, some officers don't think so. Captain Ronald Tracey of the Exeter gave his aid to a civilization on Omega 4. Nikolai Rosenko forced Captain Picard to relocate a race to another planet, nearly ending his career. We take this shit seriously."

Marcus nodded. He realized it now - it wasn't just to keep the civilizations they encountered pristine. The Prime Directive also kept dangerous weapons out of the hands of people who just weren't ready to use them.

"I advise we keep everyone on standby alert. Once sonja gets the wormhole drive system working again, we'll leave, barring any further bullshit. Any objections?"

He got none. "Dismissed."

* * *

The fucking information was gone. AGAIN.

"Who the fuck is screwing with my medical records?!" Rutia screamed in rage as she punched the console.

Someone kept erasing most of the medical readings on Ron and Riza. And she was going to find out who!

"Something wrong, Ma'am?" came the voice of Rutia's medical assistant.

"Flay, thank you. Someone keeps getting into the computers. For the past five years, I have tried to make a full biological analysis of our captain and his sister. But some asshat keeps deleting all my scan data! They're TROLLING ME. NO ONE trolls me and gets away with it!"

Flay Allster actually chuckled nervously, mostly because her boss was getting mad. VERY mad.

"Well, I hope you find the one responsible," she said. "If you'll excuse me, Ma'am, I think my shift is over so I'm going to get something to eat."

Rutia allowed her to leave, shooing her before screaming. "If this is your doing, Pinkerton, I will fucking kill you!"

Cassie's hologram appeared moments later. "Ron isn't the one deleting the records, Doctor."

She jumped around, a long knife in Cassie's holographic face. "Fuck, don't do that!"

"Sorry."

"Well, who the hell's trolling me?"

"I wish I could tell you," Cassie replied. "Unfortunately, whoever they are, they've covered their tracks well."

* * *

Flay sneezed in the hallway, the redhead looking around her briefly afterwards. "Someone's talking about me…" she muttered. "I wonder who it is…"

Eh, she'd look into it later.

Despite what she'd said to Rutia, she hoped she _didn't_ find out who erased the records… because she knew that if Rutia learned it was her, she'd be in for a fate worse than death.

She couldn't let anyone discover the full truth about the Captain and his sister, though. Keeping that a secret was too important to her true superiors.

* * *

Annette decided to pay the computer core a visit, see if she could find the one containing Cassie and fry it.

After all, they could just make another AI.

"If you're trying to kill me, don't bother. My program is spread through all five primary computer cores and all fifteen secondaries. Fry one, I'll survive. And if you fry it, you'll have to ask questions as to why that you won't be able to answer."

Annette sighed. "Am I that obvious to you?"

"No one comes to the cores except to maintain them. And with the regenerative borg circuitry, no one really needs to. You want him, but you don't know him."

"He's not afraid of me! Everyone on this ship, Yamato, Takeo, Adama, Henderson, they're all scared of me! I can barely read him, but he has all the traits of a man that any woman would want: loyalty, honesty, truthfulness—"

"And blunt. Now you see why I fell in love with him."

That was how it started. Ron didn't like psionics, but that was more in line with them trying to get into his head then outright fear. If they wanted in, they would have to ask.

He was loyal to his family, and would never look at another woman anywhere but the eyes if he showed interest in anyone.

He was honest, as when he spoke, he told you how he saw it, not what you wanted to hear, even if it hurt.

And he only lied when it involved the Prime Directive or a surprise that one would like.

"I only just wish he would notice me as a woman, not just someone under his command…" Annette whispered, though Cassie could still hear it. "We both want him because he's our man. I'm not willing to fight you on that."

"Maybe we don't need to fight."

Annette perked up. "What?"

"There's no law against polygamy in the Federation; in fact, several governments locally practice it. Most are just one-on-one people. But how are we going to convince an old-school, one-woman-man like Ron to accept us?"

"I don't know," Annette replied. "Though… at least we can think about it together."

"The greatest way to destroy your enemy is to make her your friend. Sun Tsu might not've been a matchmaker, but the Art of War might as well be nicknamed the book on matchmaking tactics."

* * *

Ron sat down in his chair, noting the slight change in the atmosphere.

"Is it me, or did it just get more humid in here?"

Kim actually undid her uniform jacket, panting. "Humidity's up by 40%, and the temperature's jumped ten degrees."

Ron groaned. "Cassie, stop screwing with the environmentals. I can take this shit better then my crew, but I would like them to be comfortable."

"S-sorry, Ron," Cassie replied, even as the environmental controls reset. "N… not really something I can stop from happening, I guess."

"The fuck is that supposed to mean?" Ron shook his head. "Never mind. Just make sure it doesn't happen again. I don't need my crew passing out because the deck's too hot."

The bridge crew got what just happened and either blushed (which Ron wrote off as a reaction to the heat) or facepalmed.

"I'm going to spend some time with my Widow before we get into orbit. Inform me when we're there."

"Got it, onii-sama."

* * *

Dominic Santiago could sum up his situation in four words.

He hurt like hell.

'Heaven's not supposed to hurt. Aw, fuck.'

He was STILL ALIVE.

"…Shiiiiiit…" Dom groaned out with a raspy voice.

"Ah, sleeping beauty awakens." Rutia entered his line of sight, holding a PADD. "Though in your case, it's sleeping burn victim. How ya feel?"

"Like death."

"Well, seeing as you were pretty much knocking on the door, that's pretty accurate," Rutia said. "I'm going to skip the guilt bullshit and ask one question: why the suicide run?"

"Save Marcus… and the others," Dom sighed, "They had a lot more to live for than I do now… did they make it?"

"They're fine." Rutia informed, "They got the job done: the Imulsion's gone. But you have a lot to live for, Mr. Santiago. Marcus and Anya need a godfather, after all."

Dom's eyes widened to the point of pain, which was actually rather quick. "Wha-ow!"

"Keep your eyes closed." Rutia enforced, "I still have to regenerate the skin on your eyelids. But yes, Anya's pregnant: five weeks pregnant. A healthy, as of now, baby boy. Haven't told them that part yet: want it to be a surprise. But I think they want you in that child's life just like Marcus was in your childrens' lives. Wouldn't Maria want you to live?"

"I…" Dom began, before sighing. "I… I don't…"

"Look, killing yourself was a bad idea. I know you were doing it to save them, but if you died, Marcus would only have Anya left."

"And what makes you say that?"

"His father's dead: killed by the Imulsion countermeasure," she informed. "We actually jumped into another universe while you were in surgery. Good news for you, though: you'll be able to get out of here and stop taking up one of my beds in a week or two, depending on the skin grafts taking. Going to be hairless for a couple of months, but nothing I can do about that."

He tried to get up, but all he felt was blinding pain. Funny, he didn't remember getting drunk before ramming that tanker.

"I said a week or two - stay down, Santiago."

"But-"

"Stay. _Down_."

Dom wisely stayed down.

* * *

Jaden let out a tired sigh as he placed a small infant into a crib, next to a second crib with another child inside. He tip-toed out of the room, before closing it behind him before he groaned. "They're finally… asleep…"

"Now you see what I've had to deal with while you two were planetside half the time," Lily giggled slightly as she laid in their bed along with an equally tired-looking Larcei.

"Y… yeah…" Larcei groaned. "Sorry… sorry about leaving you with them… Lily…"

"Come on, Larcei," Lily smirked as she gave her a short kiss. "It's no biggie - we're all family now, aren't we?"

"Yeah. The last two years haven't been great. At least we're on the move again."

A bo'sun's whistle went off over the PA. " _All personnel, standby for cloaking operations. Also, Jaden Takeo-Yamato, Lily Takeo-Yamato, and Larcei Takeo-Yamato, report to the captain's ready room._ "

"Oh, COME ON! We just got settled in!"

Larcei shook her head. "My uncle wouldn't call us up if he didn't have a good reason, Jaden, you know that."

Lily sighed. "Yeah, that's true… well, let's get this over with…"

* * *

Ron put on his typical civilian outfit, adjusting the cuffs of his jacket before the doors to his ready room opened. "Sorry about this, but unfortunately you're the best people for the job. I'm sending down two recon teams: I'm leading your parents down there, in one of the cities we picked up. I'm beaming you three down…" He pulled up a holographic map of the planet. "Here, on an island off the coast."

Larcei looked at the map. "Looks like there's a small town there - that where we're going?"

"Yes. We've detected energy discharges down there, so we can bring energy weapons."

"Explains the compression rifle on your back. Beyond your preference for that thing."

Ron attached his kilij's scabbard to his belt before withdrawing the weapon and sheathing it. "Better than the standard issue phaser rifles. I'll keep my cricket on me, as well as my Colonial 57. Try not to cause a disturbance down there."

"So just blend in," Jaden nodded. "Alright… so what should we expect from the locals?"

"Not sure. We ARE detecting human lifesigns, though. IDIC seems to love that particular variable. So, no armor, no uniforms. Kinda why I'm wearing this ridiculous outfit."

Heelless boots, black jeans, a simple red shirt and a leather jacket adorned the man's frame. He was right: he looked out of place outside his uniform.

"So, when do we go?"

"Five minutes. Enough time to get weapons and PSGs. Once that's done, we're beaming down there."

"Got it, Uncle Ron," Larcei replied. "Well, let's gear up, and find a way for Jaden to dress casual."

"I know how to dress casual… ish," Jaden muttered. "Hey, I'm over six foot - it's hard to look casual when you're this tall..."

"In that case, you'll go down second. Takeshi, Lunamaria, get suited up for infiltration on a pre-spaceflight society."

"Copy that, Ron."

He did a brief brass check of his weapon. "Never gets any less fun."

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: They see you as small and helpless, they see you as just a child, surprise when they find out that a warrior will soon run wild…**

 **Ron the True Fan: No more spoiler tape. That's right, kids. _RWBY_ is the next arc. We'll take intel from S4, but this is pre-season 3, so don't complain.**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Hello, Beacon Academy. Say goodbye to your sanity, because the drill sergeant from hell is about to enter your halls.**

 **Ron the True Fan: (Evil laughter)**

 **117Jorn: Just remember everyone, in RWBY… it's also a gun. :D**

 **Ja Ne!**


	32. Chapter 32

**Unknown planet surface**

* * *

 _Captain's Log, USS Ra Cailum, Stardate 91159.8: The fleet has arrived in a safe haven at last, but to confirm the safety of the planet in question, I am leading an away team to a city on one of the planet's coastlines. My XO and security chief will be joining me. Once we're confirmed the safe location on the planet, we can send down personnel for well-deserved R &R._

 _Well, not me: I enjoy killing everything that tries to kill me. I'm a bit perverse like that._

* * *

Three swirling columns of light lit up a deserted alleyway, depositing Ron, Takeshi, and Luna as they landed, all three clad in civilian wear, Takeshi's plasma katana on his left hip and his Lancer on his back under a prototype micro-cloaking field.

"Almost looks like Earth in the late 20th-early 21st centuries," Takeshi remarked.

"Technology's closer to early 22nd, sans spaceflight. Which makes no sense."

"You're comparing them to our Earth?" Luna asked.

Ron shrugged. "They're _humans_. What else is there to compare _to_? Besides, it's a universal rule: before you develop particle energy weapons, you get into space first. Every species has done it, from the Klingons to the Vulcans to us."

"Makes sense," Takeshi replied. "And yet these people have energy weapons without space flight. We'll just need to figure out what's going on."'

"Sensors picked up walls on the outer rim of the city. Jaden'll find out why they're there while we do some anthropological studies."

Luna shook her head ruefully. "Your favorite topic."

The trio exited the alley, Ron taking the lead. "Keep an eye out for speeding cars with gangsters hanging out of them."

" _Why_ do you have to bring up Sigma-Iota 4?"

Ron smirked at Takeshi, who was not happy about that. "Because the one planet you hate is my favorite vacation spot."

Luna shook her head. "Not that you TAKE vacations."

Takeshi sighed as they stepped out of the alley. "Let's just keep our eyes open for anything… odd… Ron?"

"Yeah?"

"Is it just me, or do some of these people have animal-like ears or tails?"

"It's not you. Next."

Both husband and wife wondered why he just moved on before going 'it's Ron; since when does he care?'. Besides, Starfleet was used to weird; he was taking in stride and moving on.

"Let go! I haven't done anything!"

The trio turned at the sound of the shout, to see a young woman with rabbit ears accosted by a group of people without any animal features. "That doesn't seem good," Takeshi remarked. "I say we help her out, while still pretending to be 'local' - maybe we can learn more about the local situation."

"I say we kick the shit out of those idiots." Ron approached the three idiots, grabbing one and throwing her into a brick wall with excessive force. "Piss off, the lot of you, before I decide to not restrict myself to non-lethal tactics."

"Fuck off, animal lover!" Ron simply narrowed his eyes before punching the second retard in the face, no doubt breaking parts of his skull.

"I don't tolerate racists or idiots. Leave. NOW."

The one still-untouched retard proved he wasn't _totally_ dumb as ran for the hills.

"That's them taken care of," Takeshi remarked, before turning to the girl with the rabbit ears. "Are you alright, miss?"

"I… yes, but… why did you…" She looked at the idiots. "Why did he have to do that?"

"In a nutshell? My brother hates idiots. He'd've killed them, but that would be frowned upon."

"Not by me!"

"Ron, you're the walking, talking Darwin Award Generator that seeks stupid and kills it."

Ron smiled. "A fairer compliment, I was never paid."

Luna facepalmed. "That wasn't a compliment..."

The woman giggled. "You two are funny."

"Yeah," Takeshi chuckled. "They can be."

"Oh! I haven't even introduced myself. I'm Velvet Scarlatina."

"Takeshi Yamato. My wife Lunamaria and my… sociopathic brother-in-law, Ronald Pinkerton."

Idiot #1 was then sent flying as Ron threw her onto the roof. "Idiots like you make me ashamed to be the same species!"

"Like I said, sociopathic. You should see him on REALLY bad days."

"I just don't tolerate idiots, Takeshi. I prefer wiping stupidity from the gene pool."

Takeshi chuckled. "So you say."

She shuddered looking at the captain. "He's… I've never felt like this before. I have the urge to run away screaming."

Takeshi shrugged. "Ron has that effect on people. First time we met, he beat the crap out of me."

"You were dating my sister and she neglected to tell me. First reaction of an older sibling: protect the younger. In my case, by beating you half to death."

Velvet chuckled nervously. "Uh… where did you… meet?"

"At a… combat school. He was one of the teachers. The best, actually." Takeshi shuddered a bit. "Even if he _did_ tend to traumatize most of the students."

"My school's actually looking for more teachers. I also got separated from my team. It… tends to happen."

"A bit scatterbrained of you. We'll escort you."

"No, no, I'm fine—"

Ron looked Velvet in the eye. "You refused to defend yourself. I'm tempted to toss you onto ANOTHER rooftop, though much harder. And with a few additional _failures_ , if you get my meaning. Either you promise me you'll kick the shit out of the next person that harasses you or we escort you. Your choice."

Velvet shuddered. "I'll… I'll take the escort, I guess…" she stammered. "I… I just…"

"Not one for hurting people?" Takeshi asked. "It's okay, not everyone is… but why are you going to a combat school in that case?"

"You haven't… I'm training to fight Grimm."

"Grimm? As in Jacob and Wilhelm?"

The second idiot got to his feet before Ron punted him in the face, causing him to scream.

Takeshi thought he'd heard that scream before.

"What kind of name is that? Come to think of it, yours don't make sense either."

"Back to the topic at hand, dear heart."

Velvet shuddered. "R-Right, the Grimm. They're monsters. They're the biggest threat anyone's ever faced. Ever!"

Luna ribbed her brother. "Until my brother came along."

"Unless your brother can raze an entire city to the ground, I'm going to have to say that the Grimm are still bigger threats."

Luna smirked. "Heard of the city of Thermopylae?"

"No."

"Ron is WHY you don't know about it. Bunch of idiots tried to kill him."

"I won."

Velvet actually believed her. Takeshi was not amused.

"R-Right. Uh, I can take you to Beacon. Headmaster Ozpin would love to have you as instructors, especially if one of you can… well, kill an entire city."

"They started that fight, I just finished it. Because I left no survivors means nothing!"

Takeshi groaned. They couldn't resist playing around with Ron's rep, could they?

"Anyway, we just got here. Didn't run into any monsters on the roads or trails: just idiots who are no longer being stupid."

Velvet paled in horror. "You killed them?"

"I run by a simple rule: try to kill me, I kill you. Try to kill my people or my family, you still die. I just make sure it is long and beyond words in terms of pain. I'm not a mindless brute, madam, I just live by a more honest code of conduct."

Takeshi sighed. "I did say he was sociopathic."

She led them through the streets, Ron's hand tapping on his kilij as a warning to the more stupid to leave.

"Velvet!" A redhead in with a black skirt and corset with a red cloak ran over to them, waving.

"Ruby! I wasn't expecting to see you!"

"Yeah there was a sale on specialized parts for high velocity sniper—who're your friends?"

"Uh, this is Takeshi Yamato, his wife Lunamaria and her brother, Ronald Pinkerton. He… scares me."

"Really? I don't see how."

"I kill people. Regularly."

Ruby laughed, thinking it was a joke. No one laughed with her.

"Oh, boy, you're serious."

"As the grave we all will lay in one day. Who are you?"

"Ruby Rose," the girl introduced. "One of the best Huntress Trainees in Beacon!"

"What I see is a little girl with delusions of grandeur. But maybe you'll prove me wrong. Doubtful, but one can hope."

Ruby looked at Takeshi. "Is he always this mean?"

"Trust me," Takeshi replied. "This is a calm day. He can get much, _much_ worse."

"Genocidally worse." Ron gestured to Velvet. "I believe you wanted to search for your team?"

Velvet nodded, more interested in getting away from Ron then in finding her team.

"I'll see you back at Beacon, Ruby!" The redhead waved at Velvet, glaring at Ron as they walked off.

"You're not a nice man."

"I spent eight years as a prisoner of a group of people that didn't exactly do nice things. I had to do things worse then kill to get out of there. I do not regret what I did to get free."

A half truth, as Ron was a prisoner of the Borg collective. But the Prime Directive was in play. "What did they do?"

"Things that would give you nightmares for the rest of your days, young woman."

* * *

 **50 kilometers from the city of Vale**

* * *

"Of all the places, your Uncle decided to actually take the EASIER place to beam down in!"

"I guess he has faith that we can handle it, I guess," Larcei remarked.

Another black wolf… thing swiped at Larcei, before it was gunned down by Jaden's newly modified M739 LMG. While it was rare (only four were on the Saratoga) it WAS extremely effective at killing things.

On the other hand, it was a gun with over one hundred rounds in a drum magazine.

"Jeez, it's like there's no end to these things!" Jaden yelled as he fired a burst at another of the wolf things.

"At least they fall easily enough!" Larcei called back, decapitating one of the things with her blade before blasting another with her Phaser Rifle.

"Ra Cailum, this is Spartan Takeo: mind sending down something with a little more punch. Like say a TANK?!"

" _Negative, Spartan: unless your lives are in_ actual _jeopardy, you stick with what you got._ "

"The Prime Directive is bullshit! Where was it when you helped us at Reach?!"

" _We were already involved in a battle, Jaden, you know that. I'll send down a few Lancers. Hell, maybe Delta Squad might want to join you if they get really bored._ "

Jaden ripped the head off of another wolf, kicking the corpse away.

Larcei grabbed a Lancer as it beamed down, then revved up the chainsaw blade and slammed it into a charging wolf.

The animal whined as it died, the rest of the pack fleeing for the hills, as it were. "Oh, SURE, when we pull out the Lancers, they flee like scared puppies!"

"At any rate, I'm picking up a small settlement at the shoreline. It's a port, and populated, no less."

"And we couldn't've beamed into the city?"

"If we didn't want to be noticed, we would have. But Uncle Ron made it clear: Prime Directive applies. He wants to cause no damage to this universe." She checked the weapon's magazine before slinging it over her back. "He's tired of bringing death wherever he goes."

"Can't blame him for that," Lily remarked. "Don't think it'll last forever, though… just a hunch."

"Welcome to the _Ra Cailum_. Where we go, death follows."

* * *

Vale was a pretty city, Ron would admit. It was no Kyoto, San Francisco, or Paris, but it was a good city.

"Reminds me of the Greek city-states."

"Ron! You can't mention that!"

Velvet blinked. "I'm sorry, what did you say?"

"Foreign language. Luna and I are naturally fluent in it. Really, Luna, you should know by now that I can tap into the universal translators. To Velvet, we're speaking Vulcan right now."

Takeshi chuckled. "You are something else, Ron."

"Was that a compliment or an insult?"

"You can treat it as neither, or as both."

Velvet huffed, as she couldn't understand them. "Vel!" Her ears perked up. "Coco!" She ran towards another group of people, led by a woman that seemingly walked off a Paris fashion show from the 21st Century.

"Great, one of them. Too bad I didn't bring a Lancer."

Coco looked at the group that approached, Ron taking the lead. "Huh, you got friends."

"I wouldn't call them friends. They did save me from a group of Faunus hating extremists."

"If I were allowed, they would be dead. I don't tolerate stupidity. Everyone is the same, regardless of what they happen to look like. I judge equally."

"Oh?" Coco asked. "That's kinda rare."

"Don't misunderstand what he means by that," Takeshi informed. "As long as people leave him alone, he leaves them alone. If he sees idiocy in any form, he will 'correct' it. And if you stand between him and a vital objective, or worse, try to kill him, then stick your head between your knees and kiss your ass goodbye."

Coco looked at the captain, huffing. "You don't look that tough."

"Hit me with your best shot, bitch. It won't do shit."

Coco stilled, as did the rest of her team. She then swung her handbag into Ron's head. It didn't do anything, much to Coco's surprise.

"Well, you're stronger then you look. A 90 kilo handbag."

"What the fuck are you?"

"Beyond you. Your best shot didn't hurt at all. I've taken worse."

Takeshi stepped between them as Coco began to seethe. "OK, people, calm down please. I'm really sorry about this, Miss Coco. We only just got here, and at our last destination we saw a lot of death and destruction that Ron still thinks he could have prevented."

"Didn't hear anything about that."

"What you hear on the news isn't everything that happens." Ron walked past them, his sword tapping Coco's knees as he entered the school grounds.

"The fuck's his problem? He's as moody as that Belladonna girl on Team RWBY."

"My brother has PTSD. He was held prisoner by a rather… insidious group for over 8 years. This is his method of coping with the memories."

The tallest member of the team, taller than Ron and on par with Jaden, looked at the man walking into their grounds. "Something about him is wrong. He has the aura of death around him, but… that isn't it."

Takeshi shrugged. "It's best you don't pry. There are some things you are better off not knowing."

"Hey! You!"

Coco groaned. "Great, those idiots."

Four boys walked towards them, all wearing school uniforms. "Looks like the little bunny girl found some new friends!"

Luna held up her hand, counting down from five.

"What're you doing?"

"Oh..." Four "Just counting down..." three "to the amount of pain you're..." two "about to be in..." one "For being a bunch of complete idiots." zero.

"Really," Cardin sneered, before getting a tap on his shoulder. He turned around… and stared into the face of death.

"Hello, retard." Ron's fist met Cardin's face, sending the boy's body to the ground before kicking Sky's legs, sending him earthward.

The rest of Team CRDL attempted to fight back, but Ron lazily dodged or blocked any punch sent his way before landing three blows on Russel's back, audible breaks being heard as Ron broke vertebrae and ribs.

Dove was next on the list, Ron breaking his arm and both his legs. Cardin attempted to get away, but Ron shook his head, drawing his sword. "You know..." He gripped the wire on the pommel, spinning the blade around in a lazy circle. "Where I'm from, racist crap like that isn't exactly tolerated. We welcome different peoples. You make me fucking sick."

The four started screaming as they tried to get away, and Takeshi sighed. "And here we go," he said. "Apologies, you four… this is pretty much normal for him."

Coco looked at Ron in fear and admiration.

"What is going on here?!" A blonde woman wearing a white blouse and black skirt with a tattered violet cloak ran out of the building, finally sighting Ron.

"Oh, I'm SORRY, teachy. Do you tolerate racist bullshit like this? If so, you need to revise your teaching methods. By BEATING it out of them. Or better, you make them take a few dips in the death tub. A little genetic cleansing never hurt!"

"Oh, crap. I think we're going to need to run. Your brother's mouthing off to Professor Goodwitch. That's bad."

"Bad for him, bad for her, or bad for the environment?" Takeshi asked in clarification.

"She can move shit with her semblance!"

"Telekinesis? _Please_. He'll be fine. He's survived explosions that would kill any normal person."

Goodwitch pointed her riding crop at Ron. "I want you off these grounds, sir."

"Or what? You'll spank me? Trust me, I am **not** the man with whom to fuck." He stopped spinning the blade around, catching it with his hand. "Come and fucking get me."

"Glynda, please." The woman froze as a man with grey hair wearing a black suit exited the building. "I'm sure the good man has his reasons for doing what he was doing."

"Ronald Pinkerton. I was standing up for one of your students, seeing as the 'tell a teacher' solution wasn't working. The only _real_ way to deal with bullies is to _fight back_ , show them that you're unwilling to put up with their shit. Your… colleague took offense."

Takeshi just stared as the man came in and defused the situation. "Who is he?" he asked Coco.

"That's Headmaster Ozpin. He's in charge of the school."

"While I applaud your coming to Miss Scarlatina's defense, your methods are—"

"Realistic. I learned a long time ago that you need to be nasty to survive. I do not tolerate such idiotic behaviour from anyone. If my students were being racist fools, I'd drown them. In fact, I HAVE drowned idiots that refused to abandon their stupidity. It saved me the trouble of dealing with fools."

Takeshi sighed. "Is he planning to antagonize the headmaster, too?" he muttered.

Ozpin, surprisingly, didn't rise to the bait. "I would like to speak with you in private, Mister Pinkerton. An… odd name."

Ron shrugged. "Where I'm from, the name is synonymous with hard work, justice and defense. I'm proud to carry it as my surname."

"Huh. That was a lot easier than I thought it would be. Is this Ozpin guy unflappable or something?" Luna asked.

"Better go with him."

The married couple followed Ron inside, Ozpin looking behind to look at them. "I believe I wished to speak with him alone."

"They're a package deal: where I go, they go and vice versa."

Ozpin chuckled. "Very well."

* * *

Weiss Schnee and Yang Xiao Long watched the abortive battle and the beatdown Team CRDL received. "Uh… What the hell was that?"

"I don't know. I've never seen anyone face down Professor Goodwitch."

"Face down? Ice Queen, he was going to FIGHT her! That guy had no fear!"

Blake Belladonna looked up from her book. "He also seems to not have a tolerance for bullies or racism," she commented. "If what we saw him do to CRDL is any indication, that is."

Ruby, who had rejoined her team, frowned. "He nearly killed them! That's not right!"

Weiss looked at her partner. "Ruby, many things in this world aren't right. If you think I consider what the Schnee dust Company does to the Faunus right, you've got another thing coming. But I can't do anything about it. Not yet." Weiss had an idea regarding the big man, mostly involving him, the company board of directors and a LONG 'talk'.

Say what you will, but Weiss had plans and she was going through with them.

"Maybe he could help us, too."

"You mean regarding the White Fang?" Weiss asked. At Blake's nod, she sighed and said, "Odds are he'd find some way to wipe the lot of them out - they're like the inverse of CRDL taken to extremes these days."

"But even if they're bad—"

"Rube, come on. If he kills them, it'll probably be because they start the fight! He didn't do anything until Cardin and his cronies started bullying Velvet."

Yang had a point. Ron didn't even turn around until they began their abuse. And after that, he floored them.

"We'll keep an eye on him. Maybe he can help us, maybe he can't." Blake couldn't put her finger on it, but she was getting the urge to flee.

But why?

* * *

"You were VERY skilled in hand-to-hand combat, mister Pinkerton. All of your blows were calculated, accurate and designed to inflict pain."

"That was the point. I didn't want to kill them. The best weapons to combat a Pavlovian reaction are fear and pain. Fear of what I did will remind them and pain… well, pain will encourage them to think instead."

Takeshi resisted the urge to sigh. Ron had a point, but his blunt brute force approach was more than likely going to backfire one of these days.

"As you've gathered, this is a combat school. We train everyone here how to fight the Grimm—"

"But fighting animals is one thing. Fighting people is another."

"Exactly. Team CRDL was easily defeated by you in a matter of minutes, but I get the feeling you could have ended that faster."

Ron nodded. "I could have. But I chose not to. There's a difference. And my 'faster' would have resulted not in four scared, injured teenagers, but four corpses on the school grounds. That and they outright sucked; Luna could've beaten them into the ground BEFORE I upped her CQC combat training. Before that, she sucked."

Luna grumbled under her breath.

"Oh, don't deny it. Your daughter could beat you. And she's 5."

Ozpin forestalled the sibling argument. "Sir, I'm going to make you an offer."

Luna and Takeshi paled. "No. Hell no, FUCK NO. That is such a bad idea it's not funny!"

Both had flashbacks to their Academy days, and their classes with Ron. And the absolute mental trauma he inflicted on all his students.

* * *

 **Earth, Starfleet Academy in San Francisco - Stardate 77914**

* * *

It was a bright, sunny day on Earth. Starfleet's next generation was getting ready for their next set of classes.

It was a perfect time for a date, as Takeshi Yamato had taken his girlfriend off campus to get a bite to eat at one of his favorite fast food places: KFC.

"Hard to believe a 20th-21st century fast food chain would be so successful all the way into our time, huh, Luna?" Takeshi asked before taking a bite out of a drumstick, having gotten the drumstick, two thighs, a biscuit, and some mashed potatoes without the gravy.

"A little. But my brother preferred to cook for us."

"I didn't know you had a brother."

Luna ahahed before taking a drink. "He's a Starfleet officer. Actually, he's teaching at the Academy: extreme combat courses. I'm surprised you haven't heard about him."

Takeshi nervously chuckled. "I… didn't sign up for that course."

"Neither did I! But… Oh, there he is!"

Takeshi turned to look as the man seemed to come up the road towards the KFC. "Huh. He doesn't look like you."

"Oh, he's really my step brother, but he's fifteen years older than I am." She looked at the man, who looked… pissed. "Uh-oh. He's mad."

Takeshi didn't like that. "Why?"

"I never told him about you."

"Huh?" Takeshi asked. "Well… okay, that's bad news, but easily fixed…"

"You don't understand. You've heard of Ayame Pinkerton?"

"The scary as all hell captain of the _Damascus_?"

"That's her eldest son, and if anything, he's WORSE."

Takeshi's eyes widened in horror. Ayame Virgilia Pinkerton was known to shoot _both_ sides of a diplomatic conference if neither side could come to an agreement.

This was her SON?

"YOU! You son of a bitch! Get the FUCK away from my sister!"

"Try and calm him down for me!" Takeshi told Luna. "And get a to-go box for the rest of my food!"

He then bolted, desperate to get away from the crazy overprotective brother until such time as Luna could calm said brother down.

Sadly, Pinkerton ignored his sister and chased after him. "GET BACK HERE!" The younger Yamato fled down the streets, but the elder Pinkerton always kept him within sight. "I know this city; you're not getting away!"

Takeshi jumped into a sewer, landing on the walkways to escape the Pinkerton. Sadly, he was followed. "The hell is it going to take to lose him, sicing the Borg on him?!"

Takeshi realized he only had one real shot at survival, as he bolted in the direction of the Academy. If he could get to his dorm room and grab the family heirloom katana he'd brought with him from Japan, he might be able to fend Pinkerton off…

The cadet finally reached the grounds, rushing into the dorms, activating security fields to slow him down.

Once he got inside, and up to his room on the third floor, he quickly found Akatsuki no Ken, smiling.

"Computer, override security lockouts, authorization Pinkerton Echo-Beta-four-seven-eight-nine-nine-Delta."

" _Security fields offline_."

"Takeshi Yamato, get your ass out here NOW!"

There was a wordless yell from up above as Takeshi obliged, having leapt out of his window and now descending towards Pinkerton, katana poised for an overhead slash.

He rolled out of the way, kicking Takeshi's knee before batting the sword out of his hands. "Oh, please. I've fought Gorn in hand to hand combat and disarmed Klingons on Drozana Station. You think a katana would HELP?"

"To be honest…" he looked at Pinkerton's collar, finding two gold pips. "Yeah, I did."

"Too bad. I specialize in many things, including how to fight armed opponents!" He jabbed at Takeshi's face, sending him towards the gardens.

Takeshi rolled as he landed, before getting back to his feet and charging again. He may not have taken Ron's courses, but he was certainly skilled at close-quarters, even without the blade, and had above average strength for a human… He ducked into another roll, lashing out at Pinkerton's knee as he passed him.

The elder growled gutturally, unfazed, and unpleased.

"Oh, COME ON! What did I do to you?!"

"You didn't introduce yourself to me as Lunamaria's suitor. I trust no one with my sister until I make DAMN sure they're worthy of her." He dodged several punches Takeshi sent his way, landing four on Takeshi's ribs. "I just broke three of your ribs, Cadet." Takeshi kicked him in the side, the officer jabbing and twisting his hand into Takeshi's already injured ribs. "Sorry, make that five."

"Ronald Peter Albert Pinkerton!"

The now named officer dropped Takeshi unceremoniously, turning to a woman in a Starfleet uniform with black hair and heterochromic eyes, as well as Luna.

"Mother."

"Don't mother me. Who is this?"

"Cadet Takeshi Yamato. Someone who clearly doesn't know how dating works."

"To… to be fair…" Takeshi gasped out from the ground, "I… I didn't know Luna had an older brother… until just before you showed up…"

The woman, Ayame, glared at her son for a moment. "Your heart was in the right place. Your head wasn't."

"Just doing what you taught me to do. Protect the family. What if it was Riza?"

"Then you and I wouldn't be having this conversation and Cadet Yamato would be in the infirmary, choking on his own blood."

Takeshi just groaned, even as Luna knelt next to him, tending to his wounds as best she could.

"You should have told him day one, Lunamaria."

"You're not my mother, Ayame."

"I've been more a mother then your own parents were."

"Leaving Ron to care for me until he joined Starfleet Academy isn't exactly showing good parenting skills, stepmother. Besides, I was going to introduce them tomorrow."

"Should've done it day one."

Ayame looked at her son. "Report to the commandant's office, Lieutenant Pinkerton."

"Yes, ma'am." Ron left, hands clapped behind his back.

"My apologies for my son. He takes the phrase 'protect your own' too seriously at times."

"No… no worries…" Takeshi wheezed. "I… I imagine I'd do the same… if Ryoko-nee was my younger sister… as opposed to my older sister… Though with her… it'd be other women… and I'd just be giving them healthy doses of fear… not beating them to… to a pulp…"

Ayame chuckled. "Oh, he knows fear. He just wasn't planning on using it today. I wouldn't recommend pressing charges."

"Why?"

"Every time I was accused of doing something, the charges were dropped almost instantly. No clue why. Our family's luck, I suppose." She left the area, allowing Luna to get him to his feet.

"Your brother…" Cough "Is an asshole."

"He's also one of the reasons I'm ahead in my weapons management classes. And no, not nepotism: he trained me. Besides, this is his last year at the Academy: he's being transferred to the _Tempest_ as soon as his replacement arrives."

"Lucky… us…" Takeshi wheezed, as Luna led him to the infirmary.

* * *

 **Planet Remnant, Beacon Academy, Headmaster's Office**

 **Present**

* * *

"At any rate, I could use someone to train my students how to fight people. Our world isn't perfect, meaning people will fight back. And most are trained as hunters."

"You want me, my sister and brother-in-law to teach how to fight and if necessary kill people."

Ozpin nodded. "In the short of it."

"Why don't you do that to begin with?"

"Because we thought it was unnecessary. A short-sighted decision, I'm afraid."

Takeshi sighed. "Luna and I could teach it, no problem," he said. "But you _don't_ want Ron teaching. He'll drive your students insane."

"I need the best." And that was the problem. For all the INSANITY in his brain, Ron WAS the best CQC instructor before AND after he was assimilated by the Borg.

So, in the end, the insane bastard was a shoe-in. Much to the everlasting regret of Starfleet Academy and now Beacon.

Takeshi sighed once more. "Hello, Beacon Academy," he said, facing the ceiling. "Say goodbye to your sanity. And your sense of pride."

* * *

A Grimm crawled away whimpering before a shotgun shell blasted its head wide open. "Is that… it?" Lily panted, as she reloaded her M90.

"I think so," Jaden nodded - pulling out his Kukri knife out of a boar-like beast. "Fuck, and I thought Grunts were stupid… all these guys did were rush hoard tactics."

"Yeah," Larcei replied. "They were worse than even ADVENT Troopers."

"What do you expect? They're ANIMALS. Animals don't exactly have the higher reasoning sentient life does. They run off of simple instinct." Lily poked at one of the corpses. "But even animals flee when confronted with extreme danger. This makes no sense."

"Yeah," Larcei replied. "Hopefully the locals will know more."

"If we can find one."

"Hey! You three!"

Lily shrugged. "I never said that they wouldn't find us."

Larcei didn't look impressed. "Riiiiiiight. Let's go see who found us."

The three turned, and looked at the person running up to them. Said individual was a man with short blonde hair and dark blue eyes. "Yes sir?"

"I heard fighting, so I came as soon as I could… though looks like you didn't need the help." The man chuckled, glancing at the disolving Grimm corpses. "But geez… didn't think there were any Grimm on Patch… "

"Not anymore," Jaden informed, before nodding.

"Yeah, I bet…" He said, before looking back at them. "You new here though? I don't think I've ever seen you three on the island before… by the way, name's Taiyang."

"Nice to meet you - I'm Jaden, this is Larcei and Lily." Jaden introduced as the girls nodded. "Yeah, we just arrived here… then we encountered _these_ assholes. They just do _not_ know when to quit… "

"Really? You didn't know about the Grimm?"

Larcei shook her head. "We're… not exactly from around here."

"I'd say, if you don't know about the Grimm. Nice to know you handled yourselves well enough, though."

Larcei chuckled. "You should see my uncle and father. MUCH better at the art of making things no longer exist. They actually told us to come here while they were in the city on the continent."

"You mean Vale? You guys really AREN'T from around here if you haven't heard about it."

"We're… constantly on the move. We usually avoid civilization if we can, but my uncle-in-law serves as a… combat instructor to get equipment we can't make ourselves."

Taiyang chuckled. "Then he'd make a killing at Beacon."

"Beacon?" Larcei asked.

"It's a combat school. The best. I teach at Signal Academy here on Patch and my girls are students at Beacon. If your uncle's as good as you say he is, then Ozpin'll hire him as a teacher."

Warning alarms went off in their minds. Jaden remembered the jaw Ron had broken. Lily had been around Ron for only two years but realized him as a teacher was NOT a good thing.

Larcei, though, knew the truth. "Your daughters might not survive him."

"Huh?"

"Uncle Ron… he… he actually was my parents' instructor several years back… and some of the stories they told…" she shuddered.

"My girls take take whatever he throws at them."

All three answered VERY simply with one phrase. "No, they won't."

Taiyang blinked in confusion. "…Why?"

"It's not that he'll kill them, though he's rather good at that. It's that he… BREAKS people."

"Well, we say Break but…" Jaden paused as he thought of some proper wording. "It's more like he… _spreads_ his own insanity to the people he meets. If they're competent and open to new ideas, they'll be fine… but if they're ignorant and just refuse to change their beliefs despite evidence to the contrary… he gets creative. Nothing outright _monstrous_ , but… yeah…"

Taiyang gulped. "I should… take you back to town. Then call my girls. And maybe visit Beacon."

"You spooked him."

"Uh, this is RON we're talking about," Jaden said. "You know, Mister Crazy-Is-What-Shall-Not-Be-Spoken-Of in ignorant company?" Larcei held up her combadge, carefully hidden under her jacket. "Universal Translators. Anything involving anything not of this world is literally incomprehensible to them thanks to some clever programming…"

"…huh, learn something new every day," Jaden muttered. "Come on - might as well go to town, then message Ron and see if this Academy's a crater or not."

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: Small and helpless against the madness. But what can you do? At any rate, Remnant will soon face—(BOOM!)**

 **117Jorn: NO SPOILERS RON! *prepares another M224 mortar***

 **Ron the True Fan: What the hell?! You just used the fucking tape gun on Takeshi!**

 **117Jorn: When it comes to YOU Ron, a bit of Overkill never hurts.**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Maxim 37, Jorn. Maxim 37.**

 **Ron the True Fan: Take, if everyone followed THAT logic, everyone wouldn't bother with infantry warfare and just unleashed white phosphorus mortar shells on their enemies instead!**

 **117Jorn: He's got ya there…**

 **Takeshi Yamato: *Sigh* I still like Schlock Mercenary a lot, though, and the 70 Maxims of Maximally Effective Mercenaries are fun.**

 **Ron the True Fan: Only when they don't allow shit like Spec Ops: The Line's most infamous scene to happen. We'll see you all next time on the _RWBY_ arc while Take and I have a nice LONG talk about the Articles of War...**

 **Ja Ne!**


	33. Chapter 33

**Planet Remnant, Beacon Academy**

* * *

 _Personal Log, Commander Takeshi Yamato, Stardate 91160.2._

 _It's been about a day or so since we beamed down to this new world, which the locals call Remnant. The situation isn't ideal, what with prejudice from humans against the Faunus, who possess animal features, and the Faunus terrorist organization White Fang, and the creatures of Grimm, but it's peaceful enough._

 _Though Ron, Luna, and myself have recently become combat instructors at Beacon Academy, one of the top schools for training Huntsmen and Huntresses, men and women who fight the Grimm and protect the civilian populace._

 _I expect the student body to be in permanent psych ward residence within the month._

* * *

While Ozpin said that Ron would be teaching for the next few weeks, citing the rising crime rates, Takeshi was beginning to think that was a really stupid idea. Team CRDL were already fleeing him on sight, and the last team to engage him in his combat classes, Team CFVY, had their asses handed to them.

And not just physically. He goaded them into making mistakes, getting them mad and lowering their guard so Ron could get into their heads. Velvet wasn't getting out of the infirmary for a few days, Yatsuhashi was recovering from a dislocated arm and multiple sprains, Fox had been humiliated, and Coco… well, she was going to need a new gun, as Ron destroyed her minigun using his kilij.

"Ron…" Takeshi groaned. "Think you could tone it down a bit?"

The captain-in-hiding spun his arms around, getting the blood to his fingertips. "You kidding? I haven't taught proper combat classes since the Academy!"

"Ron, you're traumatizing them. Velvet's going to be seeing that rape face of yours in her sleep for months. I'm not even sure HOW you could do that."

Ron cracked his neck rather loudly. "Luna, these kids are equal to Starfleet cadets that have been attending my classes for at least four months. I tone it down, they learn nothing."

"You're beating the shit out of them!"

"And the beatings I give teach them how to beat up Klingons in hand-to-hand, which is the point."

"And while I imagine that would be useful if the Klingons were actually _here_ …" Takeshi muttered.

"Takeshi, I'm serious. These people are harder to fight then you think. I actually HAVE to step it up to fight them. Not that you'd know that."

"What are you talking—"

"Three-hundred and seventy nine. I spotted you outside. You REALLY needed to close those blinds."

Both blushed, turning a deep, red hue.

"See, THIS is why I have never had sex. Gets in the way of the job."

"And if someone flat-out confessed their feelings to you and told you they wanted to have sex?" Takeshi asked mostly hypothetically, even though he was at least partially thinking about that one French Psionic and the Hyper-advanced AI that had recently had a catfight.

"They would have to rape me for that to happen. Now, if you're done questioning me on my teaching methods—"

"That's never going to stop."

"Fight them and then you'll go 'he was right, as usual'. My next class involves four first-years. Team JNPR. Whoever comes up with those acronym names needs to be shot. What if WE were on a team here?"

Ron left them behind, climbing back into the combat ring.

"He's got a point. Again."

Takeshi sighed. "Well, let's just watch," he said. "Maybe we can give them pointers if the situation calls for it."

* * *

 **Patch**

* * *

The town was peaceful, though Jaden was reminded of Mercy back on Sera as well. That brought up memories of the Formers and the other Lambent, which he didn't want.

"Something wrong?" Jaden looked back at Taiyang, who was guiding them to the port.

"Ah, no nothing." Jaden shook his head. "Just… thinking about something."

"You look like you've gone through hell."

"I have. The… Grimm aren't the only threat around here. We've fought some nasty shit on our way here."

"The White Fang? I thought they wouldn't attack a bunch of total badasses like you and your group."

"Well… they clearly didn't know who they were fucking with," Jaden retorted, assuming the 'White Fang' was yet another faction on this world.

"I noticed your weapons. Kinda plain, aren't they?"

"They get the job done, plus we've got replacement parts and common ammo."

"Seriously? You don't… make your own weapons?"

While all personnel were allowed to make customizations that would help them in combat, making their own?

The only people that DID were the people on the Ra Cailum and they just modified a few phaser rifles and bladed weapons from planets that were members of the UFP, which, even at THAT point, were still more or less standard. Even Ron's kilij, probably the most heavily modified bladed weapon in the group, only had changes made to the hilt to allow for greater flexibility in combat.

"Most of our gear is standardized," Jaden informed, "Makes maintenance easy, and parts interchangeable… sure we could make some personal mods, but… we really don't need to."

"Well, we make our weapons. Sure, some parts are interchangeable, but the rest… we make them ourselves."

"Supply chains would be in chaos if we did it that way. Took over 400 years for us to have standardized parts for weapons. Made getting them cheaper, too."

Jaden did not like hiding things. The Spartan wasn't truly a deceitful person, leaving that bullshit for ONI. He would make a horrible Starfleet officer anywhere BUT the Ra Cailum. But he had the feeling he wouldn't have to hide anything much longer.

After all, where the Ra Cailum went, chaos followed.

* * *

Jaune Arc didn't think much of their new teacher. He was six feet tall, give or take an inch or two, a bit fat and the only weapons he had were a simple gun and a sword. They couldn't transform.

"Well, I have to say, I'm… disappointed. I was told JNPR were one of the better teams at Beacon. Instead, I find a hyper girl, a blonde wannabe knight, a tourny fighter that knows _nothing_ of real combat and a stoic child."

…and apparently an asshole too.

"…we're not holding back on him, right?" Nora asked, pulling out Magnhild.

"I have a feeling he doesn't _want_ us too," Ren said, pulling out his own weapons.

"Quite correct, Lie! I DO want you to try to kill me. Because outside this ring, every person that challenges you in combat will be doing the same fucking thing! You will not succeed against me, but if you survive… well, you'll be able to survive ANYTHING." Above, Glynda watched in clear disapproval.

"He's a brute. He does not know how to teach."

"He teaches differently than you would, Miss Goodwitch," Takeshi replied. "Granted, he is also rather crazy, and his brand of teaching… well… let's just say the crazy is infectious with extended exposure."

"He's trying to kill them!"

Luna shrugged. "Oh, he's coming close, but even Ron knows that you can't teach a dead man. Though there WAS that one time he stopped someone's heart and restarted it..."

The teacher stared at Luna for a few seconds before turning her eyes to the fight. Ron dodged Nora's grenades, even batting one into a wall before she came at him with the hammer form of her weapon, but the man simply sidestepped with a speed she had never seen before outside Ruby.

"You people suck." He kicked Nora in the face, sending her flying before he tossed her weapon aside.

* * *

In orbit, the Bridge crew was watching the battle through a datalink with Ron's implants.

"He's right, they _do_ suck," Sonja remarked. "I'm actually getting bored watching this…"

She accessed the controls for his cybernetic implants and accessed his emotional restraints.

Mostly his aggression inhibitor.

"He says they can survive him. Let's see them survive the Button."

* * *

Ron's fist impacted Milo with enough force to actually dent the shield.

More force than Ron would normally use period in a combat exercise. "Something's wrong. Ron might be trying to cause injury, but that's a bit much, even for him."

"You're right…" Luna muttered, her eyes narrowing… before they widened. "Oh fuck… the button!"

Takeshi swore. "Dammit! He wouldn't do that on his own in a sparring match… I am so chewing Sonja out later for this!" He leapt to his feet. "Come on! We have to help them!"

"Takeshi, Ron's in Button mode; that means he attacks EVERYTHING, INCLUDING us. You know that!"

"Then how do we stop him?!"

Ron's sword came out, the captain snarling in rage. Nora swung her hammer again at him after reclaiming it, but Ron simply hacked off the handle, punching her in the face before moving on Ren, who fired at him before Ron charged.

"We need to turn off his PSG."

"Right… right," Takeshi replied. "That means we need to keep him distracted until one of us can properly shut it down."

Pyrrha fired at Ron, getting his attention from Ren and onto her, nearly resulting in her losing her head before Jaune jumped onto Ron's back, making him focus on the blonde as Luna pulled out her tricorder. "Ok, access code is 071471-021689—"

Takeshi raised an eyebrow. "His date of birth and the day he joined Starfleet Academy?"

"Unless you know him, it's a difficult code to crack!"

Thankfully, Glynda joined the fight to stop him, but all that did was result in him hacking apart projectiles she sent in his general direction as soon as he threw Jaune off his back, but the distraction was enough for Pyrrha to prepare her spear to lunge at his head.

Luna input the code into her tricorder and sent a series of commands, deactivating Ron's PSG long enough for the spear to strike a glancing blow, drawing blood.

Ron's eyes refocused before he fell on his face.

But that wasn't what they were worried about.

Ron had been _cut_. Normally, this wouldn't be a problem. But this was RON. A former Borg drone whose blood was filled with _trillions_ of Borg nanoprobes.

One _drop_ would have _thousands_ of the damn things.

"Can you two help me get them to the infirmary?"

"The sooner we're done with them and Ron, the sooner we can handle the OTHER problem."

"Right," Takeshi replied. "Come on, let's get this taken care of - we need to properly dispose of the blood on Miss Nikos' blade, as well as any that ended up on the ground. We'll need an excuse."

"Typhoid Mary will do. Not that far from the truth, anyways and you suck at lying."

"Hey!"

* * *

"Ozpin, your new teachers refused to submit their medical records and one of them even refused to submit a blood test. Don't you think that is suspicious?"

"James, don't be paranoid. They may not have medical records to provide: some people live their entire lives in the wilds. These may be some of them."

"And their reason to refuse a blood test?" James asked. "Ozpin, they are _hiding_ something! You saw what that man did to JNPR - I don't know if even the Maidens could do what he did!"

"All the more reason to KEEP HIM on our side. For all you know, he's the solution to all our problems."

"Ozpin, I have obeyed your orders for years regarding the Maidens, but they are a security risk! For all we know, they're spies!"

Ozpin sighed. "If you're fast, James, you can at least get Mister Pinkerton's blood. Miss Nikos managed to cut him. A feat no one else has replicated as of yet."

"Already done," James said, pulling out a small bag with a cloth that had a large red stain on it inside. "I'm having this sample sent to Atlas immediately. Something doesn't seem right with that man, Ozpin… the same goes for his friends."

"The same could be said for all our allies, James."

On that, he was forced to agree. Team STRQ's remnants, for example.

* * *

Pyrrha wasn't one to hurt people and while Professor Pinkerton was an asshole, he was only trying to teach them how to fight people, not Grimm.

"I am so sorry, Professor!" Luna held a device to Ron's face, the cut disappearing. "It's fine. Someone ELSE is to blame for this stupidity."

"I still don't get why my weapon needs to be completely sterilized." Takeshi had been running the blade and anything touched by Ron's blood through a battery of cleaning procedures that Pyrrha thought were… RATHER extreme.

Where he got that flamethrower was a mystery, and she had the feeling she didn't WANT to know. And that laughter…

Something was WRONG with these people.

Takeshi paused, still holding a container of cleaner in his hand. "Uh…"

"My brother has a rare but EXTREMELY infectious disease in his blood," Luna informed. "He's so immune that it's not funny, but if one drop got into your body, you'd be dead inside a week. And probably come back as a zombie or something; you'd have to ask him. It's some scary shit that I did NOT want to remember."

While Pyrrha didn't believe the Zombie part, she's heard of some dangerous diseases similar to what she described as she nodded. "I understand," she said. "Last thing I'd want to do is start a pandemic - we've got enough problems as is."

She looked at the now-unconscious teacher. "But what caused him to do that?"

"Oh, he's got something in his brain to keep him from getting… mad. One of our colleagues decided to turn it off. You can see the results." Magnhild was nearly destroyed, he had PUNCHED a massive dent in her shield and finally he nearly killed both Ren and Jaune.

"I… didn't know that kind of technology existed," Pyrrha blinked.

"You have no IDEA what is in his body. Speaking of which, husband mine, I believe you have to deal with the blood STILL in the arena."

Takeshi wasn't happy about that. "And why me?"

"You're the one with the goddamn flamethrower. I'm not sure WHERE you got that thing from. That means you get to deal with the blood."

Takeshi pouted. In reality, it was Ron who asked him to deal with any of his blood that wasn't flash-fried the second it came out of his body, as per their unofficial Borg regulations.

"Fine," he says, "But once we're done here… we've got a certain _someone_ to chew up."

* * *

" _I was bored_."

"Sonja, pushing the Button because you're bored is NEVER a good thing! He had to drop his shields, and that means he actually got hurt: his BLOOD is on the ground down here! You know how dangerous that shit is when he's NOT coughing it up!"

" _Yeah, I fucked up. Admitting it. At least the blood's gone, right, sub-boss_?"

Takeshi reached the arena. "Going to clean it up… now… oh no."

" _What is it?_ "

"Looks like someone else already got to it - I can still see some blood on the ground, but it looks like someone mopped at it with some kind of cloth. I think we might actually have a Borg Emergency: Code BAKA here!"

Silence. Code BAKA was Takeshi's term for someone being crazy enough to want to either study or mess with Borg tech. Maybe it was too soon to call it, but Takeshi's instincts were screaming at him.

" _Son of a bitch. I'll start running sensor sweeps, but the shit in the upper atmosphere will limit the effectiveness: we're barely picking up lifesigns down there. If it weren't for your subcutaneous communicator, I'd have problems finding you!_ "

"I KNOW. Just… FIND that blood before everything goes straight to hell!"

* * *

"PLEASE tell me you're joking, Cassie."

" _Afraid not, Spartan: Sonja was stupid enough to turn off the inhibitor and to stop him, Takeshi had to shut down his PSGs._ "

"SONJA YOU FUCKING IDIOT!" Jaden shouted - however he had activated his helmet's 'mute' function so Taiyang couldn't hear his discussion with Cassie. "I know you people are supposed to be crazy, but THAT'S BORDERLINE INSANITY!"

"She'll be spending time in the stockade again for this."

"Uh… who are you talking to?" Jaden froze. He forgot he was in ignorant company.

How the hell did Starfleet DO this? "Uh, it—"

"Look, if you're going to say it's a long story, I will BEAT it out of you. Do not test me."

"Buddy, you would get floored by me if I decided to fight you seriously."

"Enough! Both of you!"

Both men looked at Larcei, who had pulled out her commbadge and pinned it to Taiyang's shirt. "Ron will forgive us for this. _Ra Cailum_ , four to beam up."

Jaden sighed. "Get ready to have your world turned upsidedown and inside out, Taiyang." He muttered.

Taiyang didn't get a chance to reply before he was surrounded by light. Next thing he knew, he was in a massive command center rivalling that of an Atlesian dreadnought. "Welcome aboard the United Federation of Planets starship Ra Cailum."

STARSHIP? He walked out of the lit back area, going forward. "The entire bridge is sealed: no viewscreens except for the big forward one. But I don't think Captain Pinkerton would mind if we used his ready room." Taiyang was too confused by the teleporting to object.

"Wha… you… I… ah… ga…"

Jaden sighed. "Okay, time to be blunt Taiyang," he said. "We're not from Remnant at all… we're from Space."

Larcei pushed Taiyang into the ready room, giving him the first look out the window. He was over Remnant, with a direct view of the moon. "Ok… are you guys… invaders?"

Lily shook her head. "No. If anything, we're… visiting. We're on our way back to our universe. We decided to see if Remnant would be a nice place to stop and smell the roses. But now we have a problem."

"In short: The captain of the _Ra Cailum_ was injured," Jaden explained. "That in itself isn't bad… until you take into account his blood is filled with nanomachines which if it comes into contact with biological or technology, it will spread to other organics and machines to create a hive-mind of robotic zombies… and someone took a sample of his blood."

Taiyang was barely getting his head wrapped around 'space'. "Why me?"

"Luck of the draw: someone was going to find out, you were just unlucky enough to run into us and Jaden was too pissed to remember muting his helmet comm."

He could get around that. "So… you need to find his blood and destroy it?"

"That's pretty much it," Larcei replied. "Though, there are a few problems involved… Cassie? If you would?"

A fizzle was heard before a woman popped into existence. "Holy shit!"

"As my captain would say, surprise, motherfucker. The atmosphere is putting out heavy interference in the mid and higher altitudes: we can't get any details on anything beyond visuals and atmospheric content."

Taiyang buhed for a second before blinking. "Uh, that'd be the Dust. We use it as an energy source and in many ways, it's kinda… unstable."

"'Dust'?" Larcei asked. "I assume you're not talking standard, run of the mill airborne dirt, here."

"No, it's, uh… Wow, I never thought I'd have to explain Dust to someone your age. Usually, everyone KNOWS."

"We don't, so try please. The safety of your planet's at stake."

Taiyang chuckled. "No pressure. Uh… it's basically the elements in condensed crystal form. We use it for power, ammunition...everything involves Dust in some way."

Cassie groaned. "It's like those fucking barystatic filters on Tagra IV, but instead of fucking with the transporters, it fucks over our _sensors_ instead! Did you people _NOT_ discover nuclear energy?"

"Nuclear…? No, have no idea what _that_ is," Taiyang said. "Okay… well, I guess the best way to describe Dust is a naturally occurring, crystallized energy propellant triggered by the Aura of Humans and Faunus. It's used as an energy source for virtually everything - ships, vehicles, robots, it's even used for different weapons, and can even be woven into clothes. It usually comes in four primary types: Fire, Wind, Earth and Water, as well as multiple secondary types like Lightning, Ice, Steam, Gravity and such. We use them for everything… well except for space ships."

"Why?" Larcei asked.

"It just… doesn't work," he shrugged. "Every attempt to send ships into space, the dust just… quits, Dust doesn't work outside the planet I guess - no one really knows why. So we can't send up satellites in space, limiting how we communicate… that's why the Schnee Dust Company built the CCT."

"Great. And because of your overuse of the stuff, we can't pinpoint anything! Why does this ship have to have hyper-advanced technology that's useless?!"

Lily offered her spouse an answer. "Because even in the future, nothing works?"

"Thank you!"

* * *

 **Atlesian research and development facility, Mantle, location: 300 kilometers from the city of Atlas**

* * *

"Nanomachines?"

"It's… what they look like," One of the scientists said, looking at the images the scopes revealed. "Small micro machines that are interfacing with the blood itself… I've never seen anything this advanced… "

One of them seemingly disappeared. "What the hell?"

"What happened?"

He looked back at his female colleague. "One of them just… disappeared." One of the computer screens started to produce a static image, as if something was wrong with the connection.

"This is damned peculiar." He tapped the liquid crystal display, but a tube of some kind emerged, impacting his arm. "What the hell?!"

"Sir, are you alright?" The doctor in question didn't say anything, just stood there for a moment. "Sir-Gak!" Suddenly the doctor grabbed the man by the neck, holding him up.

"Prepare for… Assimilation…" he spoke, as if thousands of voices were coming from his mouth. "Resistance… is… Futile…"

"Let go of—" Two tubules came out of the doctor's knuckles, injecting the other one with more nanoprobes while the woman screamed and pulled an alarm, but her screaming ended when she felt two sets of hands grab her and a sharp pain was felt in her neck. Moments later, she felt their voices in their heads.

" _We are the Borg. Your biological and technological distinctiveness will be added to our own. Your culture will adapt to service us. Resistance is Futile_."

And as she opened her eyes, joining the new Collective, Third of many had to agree. Resistance _was_ futile.

* * *

 **117Jorn: Oh S**t THESE assholes again…**

 **Ron the True Fan: Goddamn it, I hate it when this shit happens! Now Remnant has something they have no idea how to fight!**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Yeah, and this time it's going to be a bit trickier to deal with.**

 **Ron the True Fan: I know it's short, but you'll enjoy the next one. Just wait until next week, readers!**

 **Ja Ne!**


	34. Chapter 34

**Planet Remnant, Beacon Academy**

* * *

Takeshi would later claim that the following 12 hours of his life were the worst. He had every right to claim such: Borg technology on a planet that hadn't even mastered spaceflight and had such scanning problems that it wasn't funny.

And due to Ron's adherence to a certain part of the anti-Borg protocol, he was not informed, meaning his fight with Team RWBY was going on as if he didn't have a care in the world. In a way, he didn't.

He dodged Crescent Rose with lazy ease, making Ruby much angrier than she was with him before. "Missed me, little thorn."

Ruby's eye twitched as she used her semblance to rocket away from Ron - firing her weapon at a distance which Ron dodged - however Weiss leaped down - stabbing Myrtenaster into the ground as the glyphs lit up, emitting a streak of ice towards Ron.

The living tank, however, used his personal shields to protect his organic parts from the ice and his brute strength to break free of the ice like a weta in spring. "Valiant, but you're not trying hard enough. You're supposed to be trying to KILL ME, not slow me down." As if forewarned, he dodged Blake's stealthy attack, batting Gambol Shroud away with his hand before rolling. "Better. You actually understand how to fight."

Takeshi and Luna stood nearby, watching. "No luck on finding it," Takeshi whispered to Luna. "Normally I'd say the ship's sensors could find it, but this… Dust stuff is just causing too much interference."

"This is getting ridiculous! 12 hours is more than enough time to allow anything Borg to grow out of control!"

"I KNOW, Luna, but what do you want me to do, raze the entire planet to the ground?!"

Luna sighed. "No… no… it's just… I can't help but worry."

"He's your brother, Luna. Sure, he beat the crap out of me, but that shows how much he cares."

Ron backflipped over Ruby's attack, arms behind his back as he mocked Ruby again. "Come on, stop trying to hit me and HIT ME!" Weiss fired off a barrage of lightning dust, but Ron simply tanked the hit. "Well, that was your best attempt, but ultimately futile."

' _…four six zero zero one five seven mark four four nine three two five. Unimatrix one one five one seven six zero. Spatial coordinates._ ' "What the fuck was that?"

Takeshi looked up at Ron's exclamation. "Uh-oh…"

' _Access route acquired_.'

Yang's fist finally met Ron's head, resulting in her whooping. "Fuck yeah! I got the asshole!"

Both Yamatos rushed down to the ring. "They have a collective. They have a FUCKING COLLECTIVE."

"And they're trying to hack into Ron's brain. Oh, JOY."

Yang finally stopped cheering long enough to notice Ron's lack of movement on the ground.

"Dammit, this is NOT GOOD!" Takeshi swore, as he and Luna leapt over the railing and into the arena.

Ruby and Weiss approached the downed former drone before they heard him speak.

But it was heavily distorted, using the subvocal processor that replaced his Adam's apple. "Collective suppression active. Assimilation of all lifeforms within facility complete. Beginning construction of interplexing beacon. The Collective must grow."

Luna summed up their situation. "Well, we're boned."

"What's he mumbling about? Nothing makes any sense!"

Takeshi sighed. "Well, it's a long story, and you're going to have to hear all of it, but we need to get Ron out of here first." Takeshi tapped his commbadge. "Takeshi to _Ra Cailum_. Beam Ron directly to sickbay, NOW! We have a Collective Crisis. I say again, we have a Collective Crisis!"

And given those were code-words for what was essentially a worst-case scenario regarding Ron's borg tech… Takeshi didn't use them lightly.

Ron disappeared in a shower of light. "WHAT WAS THAT?!" And there was the problem. Takeshi was going to catch hell for violating Ron's FAVORITE rule.

NEVER BREAK THE PRIME DIRECTIVE. While he HAD violated it, Ron's infractions were countable only on one hand while everyone else…

The number was getting higher every day.

Then again, he'd been planning on telling Team RWBY _anyway_ , given that they'd been there when Ron first was affected. He'd cast blame on whoever took Ron's blood in the first place.

"That ties into the long story," Takeshi told the four girls. "I'd rather it not get too widespread, so, let's go find someplace private first."

"I would think not, Mister Yamato." A man with graying hair entered the ring, escorted by a woman who looked like Weiss, although older, with Glynda and Ozpin entering soon after.

"Buddy, Ron might be gone, but you're still facing down the two most lethal people within 250 kilometers."

"Oh, really?"

"My son-in-law's worse." And that was certainly true - Jaden was about the only non-Pinkerton Takeshi knew who was just as lethal as they were. "Now, either tell me what you're doing here, or get out of our way."

"You are coming with us. Your friend is also under arrest for causing a biological attack in Atlesian territory."

Luna looked at her husband in annoyance. "Oh, look, we found the idiot. You want to punt him in the balls or should I?"

The Schnee drew her sword. "I'd like to see you try."

"Everyone, please! I'm sure there is a logical reason for every—"

"Screw this. _Ra Cailum_ , beam up everything within 30 meters of me and Takeshi."

Glynda barely opened her mouth before the group disappeared in showers of light, reappearing in transporter room 5.

Of course, there were a few extra members there… "Ah, Mister Arc," Takeshi said with as much self control as he could muster given the crisis. "Eavesdropping, were we?"

Jaune and his team were shocked, but the general was more so. But as soon as he pointed his revolver at Takeshi, five MACOs were pointing phaser rifles at him.

"Just so you know, big guy, those things are direct energy weapons set to kill. Takeshi will survive the bullet you're about to fire. You won't survive the sheer number of phaser bolts coming in your general direction. So stop pointing that gun at my husband or I'll order our security team to SHOOT YOU."

Normally, Takeshi would be trying to calm Luna down. Right now, he had bigger things to worry about. "Ladies and gentlemen," he announced. "And idiots," he added with a pointed glare at General Ironwood, "I welcome you to the United Federation of Planets Starship _Ra Cailum_."

Ruby blinked. "Starship? As in… stars?"

"Yes, yes, we're in space. Get it out of your syste—"

Ruby rushed out of the transporter room, going at speeds only Ron was able to match using the motion accelerator.

"I get the feeling you just made a mistake."

"Not much of one. Cassie, deal with her."

" _Acknowledged, Commander. And may I note that you're pissed_?"

"My brother-in-law's in sickbay and there's a Borg collective down on the surface! Scan for subspace activity that isn't being generated by our ships! Even in this soup, you should be able to find _something_!"

"Understood," Cassie replied.

"Also, guide our guests to the bridge or have Sonja do it!" Takeshi ordered. "I'm going to sickbay to check up on Ron."

The holographic form of their AI soon appeared in the transporter room. "Understood, Commander. And as we forgot…" Ironwood's revolver was beamed out of his hands, as well as every single weapon that wasn't in the hands of Starfleet personnel. "Regulations. No one that isn't authorized carries a weapon on board my ship."

"I'm still dangerous unarmed!"

Yang punched Cassie, but the hologram simply allowed her to faze through.

"Oh, please. I'm a hologram. And an AI. I could crank up the gravity until you're a stain on the floor. But my orders are clear: take you to the bridge. Shall we?"

"Yes, we probably should, if only to get this resolved," Ozpin remarked. "Also, we should collect Miss Rose on our way there."

"No need."

The group exited the transporter room, finding Ruby there.

"I ran into something that stung and kept me from going forward!"

"That's called a forcefield, little girl. Try that again and I'll do worse."

Blake sighed. "None of you are being very enlightened. Shouldn't space travellers be… wiser?"

"Our captain is having his brains scrambled by the Borg thanks to one of you idiots; we don't have TIME for nice words and diplomacy! Now, either you follow me to the bridge or I beam you collectively into space. I don't care WHICH."

Ozpin, once again, was the voice of reason among the Remnant group. "We'll follow you, Miss," he said.

Ironwood looked around, studying the ship. "Which kingdom controls this ship?"

"We're not from Remnant, General: we have no technologies that remotely look like yours. Captain Pinkerton could explain better, but thanks to the Borg, he's currently unavailable."

Ruby, meanwhile, was staring at all the control panels. "Touch them, you die. I am not in the mood to indulge your childish behaviour."

"Come on Cassie," The others all looked ahead as Jaden came walking down with Lily and Larcei - as well as a surprised looking Taiyang. "Don't be mean to the guests, they aren't the idiots… save for the General."

"Dad?!"

"Girls?"

"Wha-what's he doing here?!" Yang shouted.

"We brought him up here earlier," Jaden informed. "Full explanation later - come on, we need to bring you all up to speed - we'll give you a full tour once this crisis has been averted."

Cassie disappeared, the hologram fading away. "What's their problem?!"

"The _problem_ , Miss Schnee, is that this crew _really_ likes their captain." Jaden informed, "When everyone else gave up on them, he gave them a second chance. Every single person would've been shuffled out of Starfleet long ago, but he kept them on, he SUPPORTED them, quirks and all!"

Weiss lowered her head in shame. "I'm sorry. I—"

"None of you knew." He said reassuringly. "Come on. Let's get you to the bridge."

"I have a question!" Jaden looked back at Ruby, who was more cheerful then the rest. "What are the Borg?"

"Well… basically cyborg zombies," He stated, causing them all to blink. "Yeah, that's basically them… only they can shoot at you too - and if they get their nanoprobes inside you, you turn into one of them… and apparently some idiot-" glares at Ironwood "-went and collected a sample of Ron's blood, since he was a former Borg Drone - but the nanoprobes are still in his body, and while he can control them when their _inside_ him… when they're _out_ they follow the same programming all borg tech follows: Assimilate everything in sight."

Yang's eyes almost popped out of their sockets. "Wait, he's one of them?!"

Lily saw fit to correct that statement. "WAS one of them. He was freed over ten years ago. But the scars are still there. We'll show you."

* * *

Sonja knew she was in deep shit for this. But after two years of building colony ships, she was EASILY bored. No excuse, but it was a reason.

"Cassie, focus all sensor scans on the northern-most continent. I want to find that Borg nest and nuke it."

"Nukes won't work, Commander Henderson."

"I make ONE fuckup and you treat me like a pariah."

"Ron is in SICKBAY thanks to you! Give me one reason to bother listening to you anymore."

"Because I am the best at my job and YOU KNOW IT. Until Ron personally relieves me of duty, I am STILL this ship's chief engineering officer! Now help me help him, goddamn it!"

Cassie couldn't fault that logic. Plus, Sonja was just as worried as they all were… well, okay, Cassie was probably more worried than everyone else, but she loved him. She had that right.

"Running deep subspace probes. It'll take a few minutes." The doors to the bridge opened, allowing a large party to enter the bridge. "If you people are going to join the 'blame Sonja' bandwagon, don't: I have enough guilt for fucking up that badly. I thought I outgrew that shit back on the old Ra Cailum."

The youngest of the group rushed to her station. "What do you do?"

"Uh… I'm the chief engineer."

"Awesome! How does the engine work, some super-special Dust? How fast can the ship go? Where was it built? When?"

Sonja rolled her eyes before growling. "Young lady, I have work to do. So kindly SHUT UP."

Ruby recoiled a bit, however Lily put a hand on her shoulder. "It's fine, she's just… under a lot of stress, kiddo," she said reassuringly. "In order of your questions - we use Impulse engines, which use deuterium-based fusion reactors to power them, and an FTL drive that, using a Dilithium-enhanced matter/antimatter reaction - not Dust, we can go up to Warp 9.999998 which is about… 199,516 times the speed of light. It was build at Earth Spacedock, and launched on May 27th 2409."

"She was launched from San Francisco Shipyards, Dock 13, right beside her younger sister, Miss Shen. And I've been her chief engineer since the day we left." The console beeped. "Finally. I'm picking up heavy subspace comms traffic here, 300 kilometers from the capital of atlas. And 1.4 kilometers underground—oh, for fuck's sake!"

"What's wrong?"

"I can't just use the main deflector to just irradiate the area with omicron and neutron radiation: the amount I'd have to use would kill everything within five THOUSAND kilometers! We're going to have to mod a torpedo, get it down there and blow up the site!"

Pyrrha stepped forward. "How many people are down there?"

"There's around 6000 hostiles and growing. I presume you got the Borg talk from Jaden?"

"Done," Jaden nodded.

"Then it seems the course of action is clear - we need to establish a perimeter around the whole area, quarantine the whole zone and fortify the whole encirclement. We can keep the Borg contained for the time being, but it probably won't outright stop them."

"It'll buy enough time to get Delta down there and kill the bastards. We'll have to burn the entire area to the ground."

"There has to be another way. There are people down there!"

"Cassie, do we have visuals on the location yet?"

"Stand by."

The big screen began to display visuals of a town on the ground, with people fleeing from a small army of mechano-zombies. One of the, a woman, was shot by a green disruptor bolt, knocking her to the ground while a drone grabbed her and injected her with nanoprobes.

Ruby, watching the whole thing, got angrier as she watched it happen, and as the woman joined the army of the cybernetic undead. Her eyes scanned the room for something she could use, finding it on the far wall.

A wall that was segmented and had, in tiny bars, the words 'weapons locker' in them. She jumped over the console, much to Sonja's dismay and annoyance as she opened one of them, grabbing a rifle out of it. "I'm going down there!"

"Whoa whoa whoa," Jaden said, putting a hand on her shoulder. "Before we go all guns blazing, we need a plan Ma'am. We _are_ going down there, and we _will_ protect and rescue as many people as possible."

"Besides, you're not going to want energy weapons. They adapt after four or five shots." Ruby scowled, although cutely, which was… oddly fitting, and simply clutched the rifle tighter. "Oh, hell, keep the damn thing. It's not like you people can reverse engineer our weapons, anyways."

Jaden gave Sonja a look of 'the fuck are you thinking?' before the engineer shrugged. "They barely have particle weapons and they don't even have nuclear energy; what are the chances they can make a phaser rifle?"

"Don't tempt fate, Sonja." Jaden said, before looking over them all. "Alright, if you're coming with us, grab your gear and suit up. We'll head down to the surface, establish the perimeter, and quarantine the whole area. We'll evacuate as many people as we can from the zone, but if they've been borgified - shoot to kill, trust me, you'll be doing them a favor."

"How are we doing them a favor? We can save them! Your Captain—"

"Was a fluke. He took a grenade to the face to knock out that transceiver in his spine-which is the secret to him kicking your collective asses, by the way-to free him from the Collective, and even THEN it took him four hours to stop trying to kill everyone. Trust me, unless you take out what makes the Borg's hive mind work, it's not worth it. It's easier just to kill them."

Pyrrha wanted to object. But the looks on everyone's faces said it all. They knew. They knew how to fight them, they'd fought them before. And they'd suffered for it.

"Who did you lose?"

"To the Borg? Everyone on this ship had someone at that godforsaken star." Sonja got up, tapping her commbadge. "Henderson to Delta Squad: meet me in transporter room four in five minutes. We're going to fight someone you've never fought before."

" _The Borg? About fucking time!_ " The squad leader shouted. " _Lily gave us some new weapon we've been dying to try out on those freaks!_ "

"We're coming with you!"

Sonja groaned. "Cassie, take them to weapons locker six and give them their guns back. They're going to need them."

* * *

Takeshi looked at Ron, laying on the central biobed in sickbay. "How is he?"

"Do the words 'scrambled eggs' mean anything to you? The Borg are trying to reclaim his mind. Thankfully, Sonja and I managed to get some makeshift firewalls of sorts keeping them from doing just that, but I can't keep them out forever."

Takeshi sighed. "Do what you can, Rutia," he said. "Heck, maybe even call Annette in here, see if she can use her Psionics to shield Ron's mind. I'd try, myself, but he'd want me doing my job."

"This isn't psionics, Commander; they're using that damned transceiver! Fucking thing lets him use those RATO-AG boots of his, that modified floater, his tricorder AND provides a link to the compression rifle's sights, but now it's doing its' original job: connecting him to the Borg."

The doors to sickbay opened, allowing Luna to come in. "Sonja's assembling Delta Squad in transporter room four. Larcei, Jaden and our guests will be joining them."

Takeshi stopped slouching, standing straight. Now he could do something. "Tell them I'll be there—"

"We're not going."

"What the hell do you mean we're not going?"

"Starfleet regulations. As of the moment he stopped moving, you became the ship's commanding officer. And you can't leave the ship."

Takeshi had never had much use for regs - yes, he tended to follow them for the most part because of Ron, but… "I need to get down there, Luna - I just can't sit or stand around up here, doing essentially nothing."

"If you think I don't want to go down there, you're out of your fucking mind, husband. But you know EXACTLY what Ron would do." Takeshi knew: the only thing Takeshi had objected to about the Code Baka protocols involved Ron, a photon torpedo and both of those being at the center of a Borg infestation.

That could not happen. While their first meeting was violent, the two bonded in an unlikely way before he left Earth. So no, Takeshi wasn't going to let him die. FUCK THAT.

"Yeah," he muttered. "Alright, fine, we'll stay here…"

"If it keeps him from committing suicide—"

The hiss of the doors opening signalled two more arrivals: Lily and a VERY annoyed-looking annette Durland. "Oh, boy. Ms, Durland, there's not much you can do. He's being attacked in ways that aren't telepathic."

"I don't care, Commander. I will NOT allow the borg to take him away. I will do what I can to assist."

Luna groaned, facepalming. "And what about you, Lily?"

"I'm going to try and shut off his transceiver."

Annette cracked her knuckles as she walked up towards Ron. "I _know_ you hate it when people get in your head…" she muttered, "But this is for your own good…" She placed her hands on either side of his face, before her psionics flared to life in her eyes, with purple energy enveloping her eyes and his head.

* * *

Annette blinked as she suddenly found herself in the corridors of a Starship, much like the _Ra Cailum_. "…Ron?" She called out, glancing around. "Ron are you here?"

"One-one-Five-six-seven-four, grid fourteen by one hundred. New species identified, subspecies of Species 5618. Genetics changed: night vision improved, skeletal structure lighter by 65%." Voices that didn't belong. Great.

She entered the halls, finding people in alcoves that were forming out of the walls. "Analysis continues. Species is useful as agile tactical drones. Recording for the Collective."

"You do not belong in his mind."

Several people, now wearing Borg exoplating, stepped out of the alcoves. "He belongs to us, now. It is only a matter of time."

Annette's eyes flared purple "Over my dead body," she growled. She pushed her hands forward, and unleashed a psionic blast which sent the Borg drones and Queen flying back down the corridors. However more Drones began to appear down the halls, as Annette simply cracked her knuckles. "You picked the _wrong_ day to fuck with his head,"

"You cannot win against us. We are a tide that does not ebb. You can never destroy us. He is ours."

That was the last straw. Ron was not Borg. "Get out of his head. Because if you don't, I'll find a way to kill you using him!"

The voice of the queen echoed through his mind. "This world is ours. Resistance is and always has been and will be… futile. Once we have your fleet, we will be able to contact the Collective. We will be whole again."

"You'll be in _pieces_ when we're done with you!" Annette growled, as a Borg tried to grab her, only for her to grab him by the neck - and squeezed hard enough to pop his head clean off - kicking the lifeless corpse away.

"You will join us. The moment you joined your mind with his, you gave us something." Annetta growled before the Queen finished. "You gave us the _Ra Cailum's_ location."

Annette KNEW the Queen was bluffing, but she knew the Borg: they adapted. Eventually, they would find a way to beam onto the phase-shifted superdreadnought. And once the _Ra Cailum_ was theirs, the fleet was next.

"Get out… of my boyfriend's HEAD!"

* * *

Rutia monitored the readouts, checking for anything out of the ordinary. "Come on, come on…"

"Should we start operating, Doc?"

"Not yet: Annette's still connected to the hive mind, same with Ron. As soon as she does whatever she's doing—"

Annette let go of Ron's head, panting as though she'd run the entire interior of the ship. "Turn off his neural transceiver! The Borg are looking for the Ra Cailum!"

"What-"

"They're after the _Ra Cailum_!" Annette shouted out again, "They want to take control of it! Then the whole fucking fleet! SHUT IT DOWN NOW!"

"Help me get him on his stomach!" Annette grabbed onto Ron's arm, Lily taking his legs while Rutia pushed the rest. It took a moment, but their captain was now unceremoniously on his gut. "Laser scalpel. We're going to have to do this the hard way."

"Define 'hard way'!"

"I need to get at the transmitter itself and manually shut it down!"

Takeshi just watched as they took a laser scalpel and began working to get to the neural transceiver.

"Son of a bitch has to have thick skin. Cassie, any subspace activity going to Ron's brain?"

"The Borg are searching for the Captain's IP address, as it were, but Miss Durland scrambled it. You have two minutes before they get back in."

"Small mercies!" She hacked away at the skin on the back of his neck, knowing he'd have scars later, but he could bitch later.

He'd be alive to bitch.

She finally peeled away the skin, revealing the gray metal that made up the transceiver that was built into his third and fourth cervical vertebrae. "Great, getting flashbacks."

"Flashbacks?" Lily asked. "Flashbacks to what?"

"The last time I did this was at Vega colony, and that time I shoved a piece of metal into his head."

"The Borg are picking up his signal again. Approximate time to connection, 30 seconds."

"Screw this, he can shoot me later." She grabbed a small, thumb-sized weapon from the kit: a type-1 'cricket' phaser.

"Setting 4 will do the trick."

Lily's eyes widened. "NO!"

Rutia fired the phaser at ron's spine, shorting out the transceiver. "Well… He's going to kill me later."

"Are you sure? You just shot him with a phaser!"

"Oh, please: the Borg replaced that particular section of spine. How the hell he SURVIVED that in the first place is beyond me. Anyway, Lily, you and I have work to do: I just fried his transceiver. And made him a quadriplegic. We need to repair that thing without fixing the subspace transceiver, or else when he uses the nanoprobes to do it, he'll kill me for causing it and YOU for standing around and letting it happen!"

"I doubt he'd do that."

"Apparently, you don't know him as well as you think."

"R… right," Lily replied. "OK, so, what do we need to do?"

It was going to take a while to get it done, but at least Ron wasn't tied to the burgeoning collective anymore.

* * *

Down in the transporter room, the various people who were going down into Borg Central were gearing up.

"I just got word from Commander Drake, he's agreed to send the Marines and ODST's to the surface with our personnel," Jaden informed Takeshi. "So have Adama and the Colonial Marines, as well as the Gears. They will establish a perimeter around the area affected and make sure not one Drone passes through their lines. General Ironwood has also called for Atlesian forces to give us additional support - claiming he's wants to make up for his mistake."

" _Very good, we're going to need them. Make sure the ground team has more than enough ammunition to… handle the Borg._ "

"You don't look like your mind's on the job."

Takeshi chuckled humorously. " _It's not. Jaden, my friend, my brother-in-law, is in sickbay. I just saw rutia take a phaser to his spine just to cut him off from the collective. I can barely command a ship full of fifty people, bot now I'm expected to take command of not only a superdreadnought, but the fleet, while I worry about Ron? There's no way I can keep my mind on the job._ "

"Fair enough," Jaden nodded "Anyways, the plan will be that I'll head into the area with Mythic team, along with XCOM Alpha, and Delta Squad - along with RWBY and JNPR. We'll try and evacuate as many non-assimilated civilians as we can, but once we're done anything else in the zone is free game. We're not taking any chances. "

" _Try to get it done fast. Ron had an extra tacked onto a situation like this._ "

"Extra what?"

Takeshi shook his head, seething. " _He… he decided that he was a greater danger to everyone. If something like this happened, he planned to take a photon torpedo and blow up the affected area and himself._ "

"What the hell was he THINKING, making that protocol?"

Takeshi shrugged. " _Guilt. I'm no psychologist, but I think he blames himself for Vega Colony. Just like you blame yourself for Noble Team._ "

Jaden was oddly silent for a moment after that "…it's crazy how similar we are…" he muttered, "But… hopefully we can crush the Borg here before the damage gets more widespread, so we won't have to resort to _that_."

" _Agreed,_ " Takeshi replied. " _I'll keep an eye on things up here, make sure Ron doesn't do anything stupid. You just focus on getting things done down there._ "

"You got it, Jaden out." He nodded as he turned the comm off, before turning to the others. "Alright everyone, you know your mission. We save as many people as we can, but if someone has been borgified, you shoot first - ask questions later. Understood?"

All but Blake on Team RWBY had sour looks on their faces, as did Team JNPR. "Your captain was saved." Sonja racked the bolt on her M960. "By a fluke. The only way to save them all is to knock out their hive mind, but they have three things keeping them together: the central plexus, which keeps them all linked to the collective at large, the vinculum, which regulates their minds, keeps them all on rails, for lack of a better term, but if they're expanding like this… They're got the third one. Which makes this harder."

Ruby winced. "What?"

"The Queen." Sonja said, "They managed to get cloning technology from Ron's brain, as well as DNA patterns, so they have the Queen."

"Wait… didn't you say they were like a collective of machines acting as one?" Ren asked. "If they all acted as one, why would they need a Queen?"

"OK, taking the machine analogy to its logical conclusion, the Queen is like the… Central Processing Unit, if you will," Larcei informed. "All input goes to her, and all directives come from her. She is what _controls_ the Collective. Like an insect colony."

"So, we're fighting a bug nest. That's great."

The doors to the transporter room opened, allowing Sayaka, Kyoko, Mami and Homura to enter the transporter room. Delta actually backed away slightly at seeing the ravenette. "The hell are you doing in here?"

"We're going to be joining you. Cap's an asshole, but he's our asshole. No one fucks with us. And Mami's kinda pissed that her dad's had his brain jacked." RWBY collectively looked at the blonde Puella Magi. "She's his daughter?! How? Who?"

"Well, on the one hand, she's technically adopted," Larcei replied. "On the other… well, she's the daughter of an alternate universe version of Ron, and her native family was killed a few years before we ran into her, so our Ron basically took over the role."

"Uh…"

"Multiversal physics." Jaden said, "You'll get the hang of it. Now, load up. We're not going to find any spare ammo down there, so please conserve your shots. That won't be a problem for most of you, but some, that's another story."

"Understood," Blake nodded, loading up with dust rounds. "Guess we'll find out if Borg can adapt to Dust."

Delta squad and Alpha Squad stepped into the transporter, which cycled quickly, allowing Mythic to follow. Jaden and Larcei were next, joined by Team JNPR.

Ruby stared at the transporter, gulping as she stepped onto the pad, joined, albeit reluctantly, by her team. "Uh… is there something usually said when people… do this?"

The Tellarite simply said one word. "Energize." He cycled the transporter, Ruby watching as light and dust entered her view. It was time to fight.

And time to sacrifice.

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: Ladies and Gentlemen, the shit has now hit the fan. Hope you have umbrellas and a sponge handy.**

 **Ron the True Fan: Try soap and bleach. And plasma coolant. LOTS of plasma coolant.**

 **117Jorn: The Exterminators are-a com'in! The Borgbusters!**

 **Ron the True Fan: (Ghostbusters theme plays) When there's something freaky in your solar system, who ya gonna call? Borgbusters! (Gets looks from Team RWBY) What?**

 **Yang: …and people say _my_ puns are bad…**

 **Ron the True Fan: They are. For a while, watching _RWBY_ made me pick up your bad habits. (Yang arms Ember Celica) Oh, you want to play that way? (Pulls out Mk 3 Lancer) Let's dance, blondie! (combat begins)**

 **Ruby: We should just… go… right?**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Yeah, might as well get out of their way… (watches as some of Yang's hair is severed by the Lancer and floats past her eyes) On second thought, RUN! OUT OF THE BLAST RADIUS, NOW!**

 **117Jorn: OUT OF THE WAY! *Runs away as Yang goes Super Saiyan***

 **Ron the True Fan: Fun time!**

 **Blake/Weiss: You're INSANE!**

 **Ron the True Fan: Life's more fun when you're crazy!**

 **Ja Ne!**


	35. Chapter 35

**Planet Remnant, 300 kilometers from Atlas - Borg Quarantine Zone**

* * *

Mantle was a cold and desolate place. The closest equivalent to it on Earth would be Sub-Siberia, with small patches of forest. Every plant was dead, leaves falling off quickly. The area was worthless to life.

This was the sight the away teams beamed into, which Weiss was horrified by.

Larcei's reaction was: "I've seen colder." And she had - her Aunt Ryoko had had to take her along on a trip to Andoria once.

"Nanoprobe infestation is at 24%." Sonja ran her tricorder over a tree. "They're being reconfigured to produce methane, carbon monoxide and fluorine. Lovely. We're going to have to use two torpedoes: one for the underground, one above."

"How can you be so cold?! This is our home, and you're just… emotionlessly stating worthless facts!"

"Look, it's taking every ounce of my control not to just go charging at the Borg screaming like a banshee," Larcei said point blank. "I hate the Borg for what they did to Uncle Ron, and the fact that there's a new collective forming just because _someone_ couldn't leave well enough alone-" there was a pointed glance at Ironwood at this, "-it's… I'm having problems keeping myself in check."

"Do not blame me for this, young woman! If your uncle would have given up his medical records—"

"What medical records? They don't exist here!"

"Uh, guys…" Baird pointed in the distance, where two figures stood. "I think we got company!"

"Perfect. I need to kill something. And I got tired of hearing about the Borg from you guys." Marcus charged the handle of his Lancer.

"Agreed," Larcei remarked. "Let's go massacre some cyborg zombies!"

"Before you idiots start shooting, I'm going to jam their subspace comm; once they lose their link, they'll be stick with pre-programmed instructions." Sonja activated her tricorder, the two drones looking confused before Marcus opened fire with the Lancer, killing the two former Remnant natives.

"That was easy."

"Try fighting a horde of them. Once you run out of ammo, you're screwed."

Team RWBY were understandably shocked at seeing the two drones killed so easily.

Sonja scanned the bodies. "General, who were the research staff?"

"Why?"

"Answer the question."

Ironwood sighed as Sonja scanned the bodies, sweeping them. "324 researchers, all human, plus a few… Faunus workers."

Sonja pulled out her knife, hacking through the exoplating. "That ain't a white lab coat."

Ironwood looked at the exposed clothing. The emblem on it was a cat's snarling head with three claw marks. "Friends of yours?"

"White Fang," Blake informed. "They… used to be a Faunus Rights group, before they came under new management and became a bunch of terrorists."

"Must've attacked the facility after the borg took over." The two bodies then dissolved. "Well, nice to know SOME things don't change."

"You just… disintegrated them!"

Sonja scoffed at Yang's accusations. "The Borg do that all the time. They don't leave the dead." The officer approached the outer wall of the town, finding a single massive hole in it, Grimm keeping a VERY noticeable distance. "You're a lot wiser than we are."

"Wow…" Ruby breathed. "Normally Grimm will just attack any human settlements they come across. For them to be keeping their distance…"

"Oh, they learned." a single grimm was in the town, moaning. The Beowolf looked at Ruby with what could only be called pleading eyes as she noticed it had Borg implants on its' skin, only barely showing. "They… assimilated it?"

"Not completely. That thing's asking you to kill it." Ruby was torn now. Her training as a huntress demanded her to kill that Grimm, yes, but it was suffering. In pain.

How could she feel pity for a Grimm?

She didn't even notice Sonja drop a case to the ground, putting a weapon together. It was a long barreled PTRS-41 anti-material rifle used by the Soviet army.

Originally, Sonja was going to give it to Luna for her birthday, but she figured with the SRS-99 she now used, it was pointless.

There was a loud bang as the weapon discharged, and the Beowolf's head exploded.

"Well, that was more kick then I thought. FUCK!" Four drones looked at them before marching towards them, fully assimilated but missing most of their more developed implants. Sonja didn't care.

She just took aim and opened fire. One, a man, was killed instantly. The second shot removed the torso from a woman, her legs marching forward before they fell down. "Stop that! We're trying to save them!"

"There's no saving these people." Sonja fired again, blowing the head off a former White Fang grunt.

Ruby then took the weapon out of Sonja's hands. "You're nothing but murderers!"

"Then show me how you plan to save them, little girl."

Ruby drew her phaser rifle, made sure the thing was set for stun based on the brief instruction she'd gotten, and then opened fire.

One drone was knocked down, unconscious. She kept firing, one drone falling down as Sonja shook her head. "You have no idea. No idea."

"Shut up!" She fired again, but this time, the bolt impacted a field of energy.

"What the…" She fired again and again, but the three shots did nothing. The drone got within 15 fifteen feet before Sonja took the PTRS up again and fired it, killing the drone.

"Now you know why we're not bothering with phasers. Grow up." she flipped the magazine well open, the enbloc falling to the ground before she put in another magazine, closing the catch before cocking the bolt back.

"Yeah, not something you'd expect, would you?" Larcei asked. "The first few shots, it seems to work just fine, and they can easily be stunned or otherwise taken down. But then… they adapt. It's what they do. Even if you readjust the frequency on your weapon, it only takes another couple of shots before they adapt again. Energy weapons, while good for most things… don't work on Borg with any reliability."

"But we can't just kill them!"

Sonja scoffed. "They were dead the second they got assimilated."

Ruby glared at the engineer, who simply continued firing, joined by Markza fire from that Padik man and Longshot fire from Byrne.

Even Ironwood was horrified by the seemingly callous reactions of the Starfleet people and their allies. They weren't even TRYING.

"Believe me, General…" He looked at Larcei, who took the blunt head of an ax to break the bones of the downed drones to keep them from moving. "If we could help them without getting ourselves killed, we would. Even my uncle said that Rutia took a hell of a risk saving him."

"So… you're speaking from experience when you say…"

"When Jean-Luc Picard was captured by these bastards, 39 starships and 11000 people were killed or assimilated. It took something the Borg had no idea could HAPPEN to stop them from assimilating Earth and save the captain. They've adapted since then. So, when you people understand how to fight them, THEN you can judge our methods. Until then, watch."

A roar was heard before another Grimm, an Ursa Major, ran into the square, covered in Borg implants. "Oh, great."

"I hope Lily gave us a rocket launcher, Jaden," Larcei told her husband. "We're gonna need it."

"Who needs rockets?" Baird pulled out a massive weapon. "Oneshot, one kill, as the COG loves to say!" He planted it on the ground before taking aim at the Grimm, firing the weapon, which impacted and tore off two of its' limbs, but not killing it. "Oh, fuck."

Ruby pulled out Crescent Rose, transforming it to its' scythe state. "Come on, Team RWBY!"

The other three team members drew their weapons and leapt into the fray, giving the Deltas and everyone else who hadn't seen it already a first-hand look at how Remnant Huntresses worked, Ruby darting around like a housefly on crack, Weiss and her glyphs striking out and immobilizing the thing, Blake darting about and striking from the shadows, and Yang simply punching it.

In the end, this would cause RWBY's downfall. For now, though, it succeeded in stopping the Borg-Ursa long enough for Baird to reload the Oneshot and fire once more, decapitating it.

"Fuck yeah!"

Paduk looked at the corpse. "Eh, I could have done better."

"Hey!"

Sam fired off one more shot, killing another Borg. "Hey, where's the entrance to that facility?"

"In a coffee shop, in the back."

Marcus wanted to SHOOT the General now. "A fucking public place?! You were BEGGING for this shit! Give me one reason not to fucking chainsaw your ass!"

Sonja grabbed Marcus' Lancer, forcing it down. "Because the Captain would want him ALIVE."

The group steadily moved forward, taking down any Drones in their way - the Remnant natives focused on the Grimm, while the dimensional travelers focused on the human and Faunus drones.

Marcus had an unlucky encounter with an Ursa, but he fell back on his decade and a half of fighting monsters on Sera.

In short, he chainsawed the fuck out of it, proving that, 40 years old or not, Marcus was a BADASS, as he hacked off one arm after another before chainsawing its' guts out and finally decapitating it. "Fuck you!" A Beowolf rushed at him, but all the Gear did was pull out his handgun and fire a single round into its' head, the 50 cal bouncing around like a pinball inside its' skull.

Ironwood and Winter watched as Marcus approached a larger Beowolf Ultra. "Come and fucking get me."

"Geez, Marcus, save some for the rest of us!" Larcei quipped teasingly - though really, there was plenty for everyone.

The Ultra charged, Marcus pulling out a bolo grenade and whipping it around in his hand. "Eat shit and die!" He threw it, firing his Lancer blindly at the Grimm before the grenade stuck to its' head, exploding seconds later, killing the Borg freak.

Winter approached the veteran Gear, who reloaded his weapon. "Where… where did you learn how to fight like that?"

"Fighting men and monsters for 23 years." Another drone approached Marcus, but the man just used the chainsaw to hack it in half. "You bastards ruined my day. I was going to spend my day with my girl, but you assholes pulled me down here! Now you're gonna fucking pay!" The Borg began pulling back, almost running from Marcus alone.

Team RWBY approached the battlezone, finding the sight of Marcus covered in Grimm and human/faunus blood… Well, Marcus made the Borg run away.

That was terrifying.

On the plus side, the coffee shop was in sight now.

"Alright, the second we get inside, we're going to be out of contact until we take out the subspace jammers. And for fuck's sake, people, don't bother with disabling shots. Just kill them. It's no different than fighting those animals."

"Yeah, right."

Marcus took a chainsaw to the door, opening an access point.

"I didn't fight against mutated freaks of nature that carried guns for 16 years to have a blonde brat argue with me about morality. Trust me, these Starfleet people know what they're talking about when it comes to these… cyborg fucks."

"Let's just go already," Ruby said, having reached the point where she didn't want to argue anymore… her worldview had taken a serious hit, and she was trying her best not to think about it.

Weiss looked at Ruby with a discreet worried look. She may have not gotten along with her energetic team leader at first… but she had grown on the heiress - a bit more than she would ever admit to anyone.

Seeing her like this… it wasn't right.

The Gear kicked open a back door, finding dozens of assimilated appliances. All inactive (they'd done their job) so he just ignored them. "Where's the lift?"

"It's behind the freezer. Sometimes the cliches work." Yang just rushed ahead and punched the bulky machine out of the way, finding no lift, but an empty shaft.

"Aww, fuck."

"We can still get down. Just won't be as fun. For most of you."

Paduk laughed. "I did not make a mistake joining you, Damon. This is better than fighting grubs!"

* * *

 **USS Ra Cailum**

* * *

Ay-li Shen had never operated on a man before.

Though Ron was closer to a machine then a man, he was organic enough to be still be a man.

Still, it had taken a while, but they'd finally managed to reconnect his spine without repairing the Neural Transceiver.

That was a bit of a mistake. "Ladies, while I am used to sleeping on my stomach, I would VERY much like to be able to MOVE MY LIMBS!" Rutia chuckled. "Whoops. Woke him up before we finished." Rutia pulled out a microfusion laser and put the final touches on Ron's spine, reactivating his PSG and giving him full movement again as soon as she sealed up the back of his neck.

The ex-drone rose from the biobed, looking as mad as ever. "What happened? And I want FULL details, Lieutenant!"

Lily blinked at the fact that Ron had just given her a commission, but she said, "Well, sir… that is going to take a while…"

Ron stumbled from the bed, barely having control of his limbs. "Shen, I find it easier to start from the beginning. So… Start."

"Well, the blood that—"

"I get that part. Who's the idiot that allowed a collective to form? I want to rip their head off."

Rutia laughed. "You flailing about like that? The only one you're going to kill is yourself!"

The captain then stood up, now having FULL control. "At least the nanoprobes still respond to my command. Well?"

"General Ironwood of Atlas," Takeshi said, walking in. "Apparently, he was just being uber-paranoid because we were hiding secrets from him, and the fact that we didn't submit medical records and you didn't even submit a blood test was a red flag."

"Well, murder time." He marched out of the surgical bay, back completely open. "Well, for a fat man, he's got a nice ass." Lily stared at Rutia, who laughed at her reaction as Ron pulled out a spare uniform he always kept in the bay, quickly slipping it on. "Wait… I can't access the ship's internal comms. Ok, what the fuck did you do to my spine?"

"We had to shut off your Neural Transceiver," Rutia informed. "They were trying to get information from you, like our location."

"…I'll have the nanoprobes fix it and put in a 'shut-down' option." He strapped his kilij to his hip, grabbing his compression rifle. "I'm going down there."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, boss! Without that thing in your neck, you don't have access to your AG/RATO boot controls, your kit, the remote targeting system—"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm restricted to my enhanced strength and my eye. So?"

"You'll need backup at least, Ron," Takeshi said. "Luna and I will go with you."

"No."

"We are NOT letting you kill yourself, brother. You will either let us help or you're not going down there!"

Ron looked at Luna and her husband. "I will note in my log that I highly object. Fine, get your weapons and meet me in transporter room one. And bring something that ISN'T a sniper rifle. You're not going to need it."

"Right," Luna replied. "I should be able to find something."

Ron sighed. "Rutia, is- RON!" He glanced back before blinked as a blur crashed into him. It took him a moment to realize the figure being none other than Annette "You're alright!"

"Ms. Durand, PLEASE get off me." Annette got off of Ron, though she was VERY giddy. "Stop jumping like that; it's fucking creepy. Is there something you need?"

Annette deflated, almost depressed. "Sorry, Captain…"

"It's fine, just… stop. I'm taking Takeshi and Luna down to the surface to deal with the Borg issue."

"I'll head down with you,"

"Huh?"

"Way I see it, we're gonna need all the help we can get down there," Annette informed. "And I'm not letting those freaks get inside _your_ head again - it was a royal bitch for me to get them out the first time."

Ron blinked. "What do you-"

"She used her Psionics to get inside your head," Takeshi answered. "Managed to disrupt the Borg long enough for us to disable the transceiver and save the ship."

"Yeah… sorry," Annette said, scratching her head sheepishly. "I… know you don't like it when people go inside your head… but I didn't see much other choice, so… sorry…"

Ron sputtered for a few seconds before throwing up his hands. "Gah, I'll deal with that later! Get a weapon and meet us in transporter room one! I have to go get shit for the ground team."

"Like?"

"Bullets. LOTS of bullets."

* * *

 **Borg 'hive' - 685 meters underground below the assimilated settlement**

* * *

Ruby finally let go of the cable that normally would have allowed elevators to come up and down the facility's entrance, though without the car, they had to use climbing gear to get down there.

Yang grabbed her sister and got her down on the ground, wincing at the sight of the formerly white walls being… converted. Black and dark green metals lined the corridors with electricity sparking across them.

"Freaky… " She muttered, before suddenly a Borg drone began to approach them. She prepared to fire, but Jaden grabbed her.

"Shh… wait," he whispered, as the Drone approached them… and walked right past them.

"…what the fuck?"

"The Borg won't attack unless they see us as an immediate threat," He informed, "Meaning… if we move quickly and silently, we can walk past at least half of the Borg here. "

"Follow the ants." Sonja gestured them to follow the drone, most of them not getting the ant ref. Two drones entered alcoves, standing straight as they began regenerating. Yang and Paduk waved in front of a drone's face, but they didn't react. "That's kinda fucked up. They can't even see us."

"Oh, they can see you. They just don't care." Sonja gestured the two to follow the group.

"Huh?" Yang blinked.

"They aim to assimilate civilizations - not individuals," Jaden informed. "So long as you don't shoot them, or do anything that will get you noticed, we'll be fine. This way we can conserve ammo until we get deeper inside."

The entered a larger corridor, finding dozens of people, all in varying states of assimilation: one man was missing his eye and was covered in exoplating while another still had the uniform of the White Fang covering his body, though the mask and helmet had been removed.

"This is freaky."

"Yeah, White Fang and humans in the same place, just… standing there. If they weren't Borg, I'd be wondering what the hell is going on." Ironwood pointed at a hatch at the far end. "That's the entrance to the main research labs. I have the access codes—"

"Trust me, they've been changed by now."

"So any chance we can force it open without getting the Borg to finally recognize us as a threat?" Jaden asked.

Sonja smirked. "Not a problem. If I can force the hydraulics to cycle, the door will open." She opened up her toolkit, pulling out several tools before approaching the hatch, opening a maintenance panel. "Manual release is online."

Blake blinked. "What?" Sonja shrugged. "Joke." She activated the laser torch, opening an access circuit before she crossed the wires. After a few seconds of sparking, nothing happened.

Ruby looked around, eyeing everyone. "Maybe we should just knock?"

Everyone looked at Ruby with a deadpan… but Jaden just shrugged. "Eh, why not?" He asked, as he knocked on the door twice… and the doors flung open as a Borg Drone stepped through.

"…you have GOT to be fucking kidding me…" Sonja muttered, everyone watching as the Borg just walked past them.

Jaden quickly got between the doors - using his Spartan Strength and armor to hold it open. "If it works, don't ask questions," he grunted. "Come on, one at a time…"

The doors groaned before red lights came on all around them. "Uh, the Borg are waking up!"

"Ok, fuck stealth; open fire!" The Gears and Alpha Team opened up, bullets flying in every direction, killing Borg as quickly as they got out of the alcoves.

Weiss fired off several lightning dust rounds from Myrtenaster, but after three bolts, the Borg's infuriating EM shields adapted. "Oh, COME ON!"

"Switch to another element!" Larcei told her. "They might be adapting to the lightning because it's closest to the energy weapons we use! Try fire or ice!"

Made sense. Weiss switched Dust types, firing ice at two drones, who were frozen in place. "We're getting surrounded!"

Ironwood fired his revolver at a former White Fang drone, then found something. "Follow me!"

The group immediately began following Ironwood as he made his way toward what he had found, shooting any Borg in their way. Though there were a lot of Borg, and Yang and Blake found themselves at the rear and facing the most drones.

One grabbed Blake, attempting to hold her still long enough to inject her. "Yang!"

Yang broke a former human's neck with a single punch before looking back at Blake, eyes turning red. "Blake!" She rushed back, punching the Borg in the face before they fell into another corridor, where an armored bulkhead dropped behind them, sealing them off.

"YANG!"

"Forget it, they're on their own!"

"I'M NOT LEAVING THEM!"

Larcei took out a tricorder. "I don't think we have a choice," she said as she scanned it. "They must have managed to find a way to synthesize some of our materials - that's a three-foot-thick layer of duranium, and while we could cut through it with energy weapons, it's thick enough that it could take hours."

"We can't just leave them!" Weiss had to grab Ruby to drag her back, away from the Borg. "Yang! YANG!"

* * *

Yang fired at another drone, killing it. "Get the fuck away from my partner!" Blake groaned as she got to her feet, clutching her head. "Are you ok, Blake?"

"I think so," she said, checking herself over. "No sign that they managed to hit me with any of those nanoprobe things, at any rate." She looked up. "Looks like we're cut off from the others, though."

Yang grinned. "Yeah, we're stuck between a rock and a hard place. Though not as hard as me!"

"Hard-headed, you mean." Hissing was heard around them, making Yang rack her weapons.

"Do not worry. You will not be harmed."

"Who the hell are you?!"

"I am all. All that is, all that will be."

"Okay, that's not totally creepy," Blake remarked. Given that the voice they were hearing was female, it had to be this 'Borg Queen' they'd heard about.

"Come. They will not touch you." The few drones in the corridor entered regeneration alcoves, closing their eyes as they locked in place.

"You know, this is getting fucking creepy."

"Yang, we don't have a choice. We have limited ammunition as is. And if that's the Queen… we have a chance to strike at the heart of the collective. We can end this."

Blake had a point. Yang didn't like it.

Blake didn't, either, but she also knew this was the best chance they had.

And so, the pair advanced down the corridor.

* * *

The group piled into a storeroom, Marcus and Cole slamming it shut. "Fuck! I thought the Locust were bad! THese freaks are worse!"

Baird pulled out a welding torch and sealed the door, keeping the Borg from just opening it. "Get anything metal: tables, chairs, whatever; just get them in front of his door!"

Jaden shoved a table in place, and Baird got to welding. "You know they'll cut through."

"Yeah, well, it'll give us time to reload! Better than nothing!"

Weiss, meanwhile, was still holding onto Ruby, but now that they had managed to at least get a brief respite, she'd adjusted her grip so she was actually _holding_ Ruby, in what she hoped looked like a friendly, comforting embrace. "They'll be fine, Ruby…" she said. "You know how strong they are."

"But… Yang…"

"They'll be fine, kid!" Ruby looked at Marcus, who pulled out a secondary weapon, which looked like the Lancer, but with a big blade. "Your sister's as tough as a goddamn Gear. Hell, if she were born on Sera, she'd BE a Gear."

Banging was heard on the door. "The bastards are here."

"Keep welding! The longer we hold out, the better we'll be!"

"Jaden, Larcei, you still have my big bags?"

"We do, yes," Larcei said as she held up the bags in question.

Sonja grabbed the two heavy bags, setting them down with a loud thud before removing a tripod from one of them.

"Wait, is that—"

"Fuck yeah." A moment or so passed before she assembled and placed an old DShK, the Russian answer to the M2 browning, on the tripod, screwing it into place. "You two were carrying this monster. I figured we'd need to hold the line at one point."

"You had us carrying a fucking DShK the ENTIRE TIME?!"

"Well, it's not like we could carry a Dillon M1D Minigun around all that easily," Larcei remarked to her husband. "The DShK may require a fixed position, but it's a bit more portable."

"Meh, I don't care." Jaden said, as there was loud banging from the door. "If it kills Borg, I'd carry it across a volcanic wasteland."

She pulled the 50 cal rounds into the receiver before closing it and pulling back the bolt. If they got through… they'd have a hell of a fight.

Ruby tried to move, but Weiss held her tightly. "Ruby, I want you to promise me something."

"Weiss?"

"Promise me you won't take crazy risks to try and find Yang. Promise me you'll be careful." Tears began to water in Weiss' eyes. "If… if something were to happen to you… I don't know what I'd do."

Ruby blinked, looking into Weiss's pleading eyes… she gulped. "I… I promise."

"Th… thank you, Ruby…" Weiss said, before she finally gave into the impulse of the moment and pulled Ruby closer, bringing their lips together.

Ruby's eyes widened at the sudden kiss… but she didn't want it to stop exactly… and before she knew it, she found herself returning the kiss.

"Okay, I-" Jaden turned around, before seeing the two - before turning right back around. "-I'll… give you two a moment…"

* * *

Yang and Blake moved through the corridors, finding nothing but Borg.

"It's like they're all nothing but statues."

"You could say they're stone cold."

Blake wanted to roll her eyes. Even now, Yang was punning. But that was something she was doing to keep away the tension.

"There is no fighting. No conflict." Two drones exited their alcoves, Blake cocking Gambol Shroud before the two simply began working on the corridor. "Once, they were enemies: an Atlesian soldier and a member of the White Fang. Now, they work in harmony. We are peace. Perfection. We are what you aspire to, Blake Belladonna."

"Only problem with that is they aren't individuals anymore," Yang pointed out. "You may bring people together in 'peace' and 'perfection', but at the cost of the concept of individuality."

"You do not understand. But you will." The alcoves hummed with power as more drones emerged.

"I think… she wants us to go on."

"Yeah, let's not piss off her majesty." The latter half of Team RWBY moved on, finding more and more 'full' Borg as they continued.

"Your greatest ally is worse than we are. His Federation assimilates just as we do. The only difference is that we tell you the truth. They lie, never informing you of their intentions. Eventually, you will be assimilated. By them, if not us. But with us, you endure. Your way of life is preserved for eternity."

Neither of them responded to this, but Blake honestly figured that she'd rather lose her way of life than her individuality. Remnant wasn't the nicest place to live, and not just because of the Grimm.

The Borg… she could honestly say she hated them. They took away the one thing that the Starfleet people were giving.

A choice. Sure, the Federation may swallow you up, but they give you the CHOICE to join them or not: the Gears said Ron gave them the choice to stay on Sera, but they chose to come with them.

The Colonials, as well, but the most damning weapon against the Borg was XCOM. They had a home, but they volunteered to join the Ra Cailum.

So, yeah, The Federation may 'assimilate' people into their culture, but at least those people had a choice, unlike with the Borg.

"You will not win."

"We shall see."

* * *

Above ground, four showers of light deposited Ron, Luna, Takeshi and Annette in the woods outside the settlement.

Ron had his G36E/AG36 plus the Buzzsaws and his personal favorite anti-Borg weapon: a goddamn Scorcher flamethrower.

"Ok, WHY did you bring the flamethrower?"

"I want to BURN things. BURN."

Takeshi chuckled. "Yeah, that would be cathartic," he admitted. "I wonder if there's a way to mount a close-range flame projector into the Lancer. Can you imagine tearing into things with an actual _flaming chainsaw_?"

"Sonja's working on it. There's a fuel problem she's trying to work out."

Takeshi cackled at the news of that.

"Men and their toys."

"This coming from the woman who wants a super-powered sniper rifle."

Ron tapped the ground, eventually touching metal. "Finally. This should be an air vent leading into the facility."

Luna, holding a BR55, shook her head. "It can't be that easy."

"The facility's the size of the Ra Cailum; the vents have to be fucking MASSIVE to supply fresh air. Problem is, this is a straight down drop, and from here it looks like there's razor wire, tough enough to hack apart bears. I'll drop down first and break them." Ron pulled out his phaser, looking over both shoulders.

"You ok?"

"No. I usually have a link to my tricorder, warning me about incoming contacts. Now? I've got nothing."

Takeshi nodded. "Gotcha, I can understand what that feels like." The purple glow of his eyes briefly intensified. "I'm not sure, but I THINK we might have someone following us. There's an echo of a mind nearby, but I can't tell for sure. Annette?"

"I believe someone is out there, but… I am not sure. I've never used my psionics to pick up people on approach."

"And now you understand why I want to get out of the open." Ron fired his phaser at the vent, hacking through the lock and flipping it open. "I'll jump down. After two minutes, follow me down. It's a straight drop, 300 meters, so you'll need your RATO/AG boots to rappel down."

"Gotcha," Takeshi replied. He was clad in MACO armor, and had a control system for his boots in his left gauntlet. "Want one of us tethered to you to make your descent a little slower?"

"No." He dropped down, snapping wire as he fell.

"Those shields of his better hold."

"His shields are the same strength, no matter if his transceiver's active or not. He'll be fine."

Two minutes passed, and then the three activated their boots and dropped down, not noticing the black-haired woman with the Grimm mask who came up to the hole after they went down.

"Something is wrong with them. And I intend to find out what."

She jumped down, following them down.

* * *

Jaden peaked down the hallway. "I think you go e'm," He said, as the hallway before them was littered with the corpses of Borg Drones, as Sonja's DShK muzzle smoked after finally releasing the trigger. "Wait, he's twitching."

RATATATATATAATATATATATAATATATATATATATATATATATATA.

"… _now_ they're all dead."

Deeper in the room, Weiss smiled a little nervously as her lips parted from Ruby's, as she continued to hold her partner. "I… I know we didn't have the… best of first meetings, Ruby…" she began. "But… I… I've come to the point where I can't see myself without you now… I… I think I've fallen in love with you, Ruby…"

Ruby blinked. Weiss was saying she was in love. With _her?_

She was a klutz, though in combat she was a master with Crescent Rose. Weiss was… Well.

Weiss was Weiss. Pretty, confident…

And her family were assholes.

She knew that. They ALL knew that. They weren't the helpful type of asshole like Professor… Or was that _Captain_ Pinkerton?

He was trying to help them. But the Schnee family were cold and concerned only with profit. Weiss was nicer.

And… and she'd become an important part of Ruby's life. As irreplaceable as Yang… no, even more so than Yang, if that was possible.

The redhead decided to, unintentionally, pull a Ron.

'Oh, fuck it.'

She grabbed Weiss and kissed her again.

Weiss' eyes were wide, but she was happy, so she leaned in and moaned happily.

"If you two are done making out, we could use some help!"

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: And White Rose is an official pairing in this story. I may not have seen RWBY itself past Season 1 Episode 8, but I've read a decent number of RWBY fanfics, and Ruby/Weiss is one of my favorite pairings.**

 **Ron the True Fan: If this is not real canon, RT needs to be whipped.**

 **Ruby: Yup!**

 **Weiss: Why do you like pairing us together?**

 **Ron The True Fan: We're romantics.**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Yeah - and while you did have a bit of a rocky start, you two do seem to mesh pretty well - just like Blake and Yang.**

 **117Jorn: People like the pairing, and I don't see you two complaining.**

 **Ron the True Fan: Especially us. Also, readers, in case you're wondering, Team RWBY will not be leaving the author's notes. Ever.**

 **Ruby: Why us?**

 **Ron the True Fan: Because you deserve it? Although we SHOULD warn Yang after she gets out of the hospital. I had no IDEA a Lancer could do that.**

 **117Jorn: You're gonna regret that you know…**

 **Ron the True Fan: Eh, I can always fend her off. Unless she unleashes Necronomicon ex Mortis, then we're ALL fucked.**

 **117Jorn: Don't tempt her. But either way, until next time…**

 **Everyone: Ja Ne!**


	36. Chapter 36

**Planet Remnant, 300 kilometers from Atlas - Borg Quarantine Zone**

* * *

The two entered a large chamber, finding hundreds of Borg. They simply stood, barely noticing their presence. "Welcome. You should feel honored. No non-Borg enters a chamber like this."

"Ok, we have an idea who you are. Show yourself!"

A thud was heard from above before what appeared to be a head and part of the torso came down from a pod on the ceiling, held by thick cables. "I am the beginning. The end." A modified AK-130 body was moved into place before the head was lowered onto it. "The one who is many." They were mated,the shoulders and head secured to the frame before the being approached them. "I am the Borg."

"So you're the one who directs everything," Blake mused. "The… 'Central Processing Unit' as I believe Miss Larcei put it."

"You attempt to apply a description where there is none. I _am_ the Collective. I exist in all Borg. Be they part of the Collective…" She ran her hand down the face of a former Atlesian soldier. "Or 'freed', like the good captain. Like the Queen before me, I hid my mind in the major implants of all Borg. Ronald Pinkerton was the Borg's ultimate experiment. For a human, his biological systems were surprisingly redundant. Hence why we removed his brain. And put in a compressed version of my consciousness. Why do you think we just let him go?"

"…that is so many levels of fucked up, I don't even know where to _begin_ …" Yang muttered.

"You used him. You let him go so that he could advance his knowledge so that when YOU took over his mind, the Borg wouldn't have any trouble getting him or his crew back."

"Yes. We do let Borg go, allow them to think they're free. Sometimes it doesn't work. This time, we were going to get him back, but instead… Henderson was VERY good at reprogramming his positronic brain. I couldn't take over—"

Blake snarled. "So you downloaded yourself out of his head the first chance you got."

The Queen's smug look was enough to piss off the usually calm-and-collected Faunus. "Yes."

"You're not going to fucking win," Blake growled.

"But I will," She said, glancing up. "Because now… he's here. He will belong to us yet again, for resistance… remains futile. "

Blake drew Gambol Shroud, but when she swung at the Queen, all she hit was a force field. "You will make an excellent drone."

Two drones grabbed Yang while another dragged Blake off, kicking and screaming.

* * *

The DShK wasn't as easy to reload as the M2 Browning HMG, but it had one VERY good side to it.

It wouldn't DIE.

Then again, it was designed by the Russians: since when do any of their weapons just not work?

"You know, while cutting down borg is fun, we're down to two more 200 round boxes and the barrel needs to cool off." Marcus roared as he emptied another Lancer clip into the approaching horde, growling as he realized he was out of ammo. "Fuck!"

"We're all running out of ammo," Larcei remarked, as she slammed the last clip she had into her weapon. "We'll need to start improvising soon."

"Then it's a good thing I brought this!" Jaden shouted, as he put down the large container he had been carrying, busting the lid open. "A little something me and Lily cooked up for shits and giggles!"

"What are you-" Sonja asked, before she saw Jaden strap on a large pair of tubes and a nozzle-like weapon "…is that a Flamethrower?"

Jaden smirked. "You wish," he said, polarizing his visor as he marched through the door.

" _Surrender, resistance is futile._ "

"Try and adapt to this," he said, before pulling the trigger - and a large plume of green gas spilled from out of the weapon, enveloping the Borg as the skin on their bodies seemed to melt clean off - falling down dead immediately.

"Holy shit!"

"Try not to breathe that in: plasma coolant's dangerous, even in small doses. Like that… Well—"

Ruby finished off Larcei's explanation. "It liquefies organic material on contact."

"It's how we managed to reclaim the Enterprise-E from the Borg. Killed the Queen."

"You like?" Jaden smirked, glancing at Sonja. "Me and Lily made it as a bit of a surprise for you and Ron. We call it the Liquefier! And the best part?" He pulled another switch, before the weapon began _sucking the warp coolant back up_. "Its ammo is reusable!"

"...Mind if I take it?"

Before Jaden could answer, banging was heard from the vents. Paduk pointed his Markza at the vent hatches."Aww, fuck. The zombies are in the vents!" Massive amounts of cursing in English, Japanese, Andorian and French were heard, as well as energy discharges.

"So who's in the vents? A bunch of morons?"

The vent in the room exploded open, Takeshi, Luna, and Annette falling out. "A fucking 50 foot VERTICAL drop! Who the hell DESIGNED this place?!"

"Either Atlas had a lot of time and space on their hands, or the Borg are just that good at repurposing things," Takeshi groaned. "And what's with that woman, anyway?"

"...the hell are you three doing down here?" Marcus asked. "I thought you were back on the ship!"

"Well, Ron refused to _not_ come down here, so we came with him."

"Wait, Ron's-"

A fourth figure dropped down from the vents, being none other than Ronald-fucking-Pinkerton himself. "Surprise, Motherfuckers!"

"…are you sure it's… _safe_ having him down here?" Baird asked.

"My transceiver's offline—" Ron pointed his compression rifle into the vent, firing it at full auto until he heard a grunt. "Gotcha, bitch!"

A fifth body fell from the vent, being a black-haired woman wearing what could only be described as, frankly, skimpy samurai armor.

Ron's boot was put on her neck, and he reset his phaser rifle to full power. "Alright, you fucking bitch, you are going to explain why you've been trying to KILL US for the past fifteen minutes!"

The woman snarled. "You're… one of _them_ , aren't you?" She growled. "I feel it…"

However Ruby looked at the woman, and blinked… she _knew_ she's seen her before, she looked so familiar… but then she recalled a photo of his father's with… "…no way…"

The woman glanced to the side, her eyes widening as she saw her. "…Ruby…?" She asked.

"...you know this woman, Ruby?" Weiss asked.

"She's… my mother," She said, causing the other's eyes to widen. "Well… step-mom actually, but she's Yang's mom! But… we were told-"

"I was dead?" Raven asked, with a sigh. "It's… a long story… " she then glanced up at the man. "…So you're… _not_ with these things then?"

"I'm Typhoid Mary." She raised an eyebrow. Ron groaned. "Mary Mallon was a woman who carried the virus that caused typhoid fever. I'm infested with Borg nanoprobes, but I can control them so long as I know where they are. But you're Yang's mother?"

Raven attempted to nod before Ron took Marcus' Lancer and reved the chainsaw. Near her HEAD.

"Well, not only did you try to kill my sister and her husband, not to mention ME, you **_abandoned your child_**." The blade began to spin. "Give me ONE reason to let you live with THOSE three strikes on your record, _Branwen_."

He heard a gun cock, and glanced to see Ruby with Crescent Rose out and aimed at him. "Hurt her, you deal with _me_ ," she growled. Weiss blinking, having never seen Ruby so serious before.

"Ruby-"

"She's still family," she said. "She… must've had her reasons, like Uncle Qrow! And she said it herself - she thought you were with the Borg! It was a misunderstanding!"

"I do not forgive anyone who abandons their family. I was raised to believe that you stand by them, you don't run off just because you're scared."

"You're half-right." The chainsaw came to a halt, Ron stopping the motor. "I'm sorry, my enhanced hearing barely caught that."

"I said… you are half-right. I took an important mission from Ozpin. Very important, to PROTECT Yang. I was terrified to be a mother, but I was more terrified for her safety. I will freely admit I am a horrible parent, but I WILL protect her."

Ron hmmed before lifting his foot off her back before allowing her to get up. "I can't argue with your reasoning."

It didn't stop him from punching her in the face, which knocked her against a wall.

"I CAN argue with the fucking method. And stop pointing that rifle at me, Rose: the dust rounds won't even get through my personal shields."

Weiss put a calming hand on Ruby's shoulder. "You know he's right about his shields, Ruby," she said. "We experienced that first hand during his brief stint as a teacher at Beacon, remember?"

Ruby huffed. "It's not over, _Captain_."

He turned his head towards the door. "I'd say it is. More drones incoming!" Ron aimed his weapons towards the hallway, but Jaden raised his hand. "One second… you deserve a demonstration of Lily's Liquefier as well."

The captain blinked. "Wait, Liqui-" he began, before Jaden pulled the trigger of his weapon, as Jaden once again unleashed a wave of plasma coolant upon the horde of Borg Drones, melting off their flesh. "Well… nice, but now there's a wall of warp…" his words dying in his mouth as the weapon sucked the coolant right back in, ready to use again.

"Did I mention the ammo's reusable?" Jaden asked with a smirk. "Thank Lily for the weapon. Want a turn?"

"If you want my Scorcher."

"Deal!"

* * *

"He is here. Soon, we will be whole and stronger then ever."

Blake pulled at the restraints on the table she was forced onto. "If Pinkerton is anything like the asshole he seems to be, I don't think he'll cooperate with your plans, _Your Majesty_."

"Of course he won't, at first." The Queen said, "But as we've said, resistance is ultimately futile. All will become part of us - Remnant, Pinkerton's ship, his fleet… and we will only continue to grow and expand from there. We are _relentless_ to accomplish our goal."

"Fuck you."

"No." She raised her hand, exposing two sharp-looking tubes. "Fuck you." She extended the tubules into Blake's neck, causing her to scream.

Yang, understandably, was...

Fucking PISSED.

"BLAKE!" Yang's eyes turned red before she broke the restraints she was held in, decapitating a drone with her free hand.

"You're not touching her! She's MINE!"

The Queen smiled. "You will make a PERFECT tactical drone."

* * *

Screaming was heard deep within the facility, Takeshi and Luna perking up as they handed ammo to the ground team. "That was Yang."

"She hasn't been assimilated yet? I'm impressed. How long has she been separated from your team, Spartan?"

"45 minutes," Jaden informed, "She and Blake ended up on one side of the door, us on the other."

"Damn, double my record."

"Your RECORD?"

Ron replaced the double-drum on one of the MG42s before looking at Ruby. "I barely lasted 20 minutes on the Tempest when we were attacked by the Borg. Once I was alone, it took 20 minutes and 3 seconds for the Borg to finally assimilate my ass. I have to say, I'm impressed." He racked the bolt of the weapon. "I'll be more impressed if she's still human."

"Well, let's go find them," Takeshi replied, hefting his Lancer.

Ruby nodded, a determined look in her eyes, when Weiss put a hand on her shoulder. "Remember your promise, Ruby."

"Don't worry, I'll be careful," Ruby replied.

"New plan: kill everything, save the princesses. Make up everything else as we go along!"

Takeshi chuckled ruefully. "Just another day on the Ra Cailum."

Ruby looked at Larcei, honestly curious. "Do you guys do this every day?"

"No. Just… once in a while. Keeps our skills sharp."

"So we bust open the doors, raid the room and-"

"Actually… " Jaden raised his hand. "I'll go in alone… I have an idea."

* * *

The Assimilation of Blake was just beginning, and they were preparing to begin the process on Yang before…

KNOCK. KNOCK.

"...Who's there?"

"Kung!"

"Kung who?"

The Door to the area was smashed open, as Jaden stepped inside. "Kung Fu!" He announced.

"The Spartan. I was expecting Captain Pinkerton." Jaden shrugged, waving his hands. "Eh, he's waiting to blow your godforsaken brains out. He REALLY hates you."

"He is the apex of what is means to be Borg. I simply want him to share his experiences with us. And his secrets. No human, not even a Spartan, could have survived what we did to him."

"Hm, maybe," Jaden shrugged. "Though look - while they're all catching up, I would like to play some devil's advocate with ya."

The queen blinked. "Excuse me?"

"You know, I was just wondering… what are you going to do if you _do_ win?"

"Continue the assimilation of the planet of Remnant," The Queen informed, "And then continue on to taking over your entire fleet, until all is one."

"Alright, but what about after that?" Jaden asked, as he strolled around the room observing the Borg.

"We shall continue here, just as we have in the universe we came from," she informed. "Expand and grow our collective across the galaxy, and assimilate any lifeforms we come across - and then we shall expand into the universe itself until all is part of us."

"And after that?" He asked again.

"Isn't it obvious?" The queen smirked. "We continue on into alternate universes, expanding and growing our collective until the multiverse itself is us - all will become one, all will become part of us."

"And what then?"

The Borg Queen paused, glancing at Jaden. "…excuse me?"

"I'm just… really curious," Jaden shrugged "What will you do after you accomplish your goal?"

"We… shall exist," The Queen answered, sounding baffled. "Everything will be us."

"Yes yes yes, sure we get that part," Jaden rolled his eyes. "You will exist as one - whoopdy-fucking-do, but what are you going to _do_? What will you do to pass the time? You will have assimilated _everything_ \- and I do stress _EVERYTHING_. You would not just be the only entity in the universe - you would basically _become_ the universe when you think about it. So what will you do _as_ the universe? Will you create things? Though I doubt it because if you created something, it wouldn't be part of the collective anymore therefore you would have to assimilate it right back - so again I ask, what are you going to do?"

"Assimilation is..." The queen began, its eyes twitching slightly. "Assimilation is… futile… it..."

"Yes, we know that - but why do you _want_ that goal?" Jaden asked.

"Every… everything must be… one… Everything must…" The Queen repeated, his head twitching as it tried to wrap its mind around what would normally be a simple question.

"And when everything is assimilated into you, _what are you going to do next?!_ " Jaden shouted. "What is your purpose when your purpose has been fulfilled? What will be your meaning when you've made the ultimate achievement? Is existing just an end to itself? Well, that can't already be it because your _already existing_ and therefore fulfilling that part of it."

"So go ahead! Create your kingdom of the Borg!" Jaden said, as he began walking around the Queen in a circle. "Let us _become_ everything, become everything there is down to the tiniest particle or cell, so you are literally existence itself!"

He then turned around and faced the Queen, staring at her eye-to-eye. "In the end, you will still have the same, damn problem." He growled, "There is no challenge left. No heaven to aspire to, no hell to avoid. You will live alone _as everything_ , and existence itself shall be your prison. All experiences will be a part of you, all possibilities will have been considered and completed. Every single lifeform, every single molecule, every single should and never should - and it all would have been done. Everything will be you… and everything will be _meaningless_."

A spark shot out as one of the Borg drones fell to the ground from a short-circuit. "And when you become existence, when the definition _of_ existence is: Borg… you will scream your shrill hiss across the totality of your being, while the lie of your existence laying bare because there is simply _nothing else for you to DO!_ "

"You… you are… trying to… deceive… us… " The Queen said, her head twitching as several more sparks shot out as one Borg after another began to overload.

"Me?" Jaden smirked, pointing at himself. "Deceive the great, relentless Borg? I sincerely doubt that."

"I… we… must con… tinue…" She said, her voice sounding more echoed as her own body began to spasm. "Ass… assimilation… is… "

"Yeah yeah, futile - we get the picture," Jaden rolled his eyes. "Except it _doesn't matter_! In the end you will still be there! Alone in the darkness of mere being. _FOREVER_. What it all boils down to it, you will become no more significant… than a single pixel on a computer screen."

The Queen screamed as she fell to the floor, just as Ron came in, the Borg not even noticing the captain nor the rest of the team. "Well, I have to say, you've outdone Kirk. Though you SHOULD count yourself lucky that bitch was hanging around inside my head: the sheer amount of insanity in there probably made it easier to break her." He looked at the flamethrower in his hands, then the queen. "You know… I'm tempted to say that this is a worse fate than death for the Borg. Locked in a logic loop for all eternity, questioning their existence. Especially for the Queen: everything goes into her, everything goes out."

Jaden shrugged. "Yeah, I didn't think of that."

"Fortunately, I don't care." He fired the Liquefier at the Queen, the plasma coolant beginning to destroy her organic components. "Sonja, jam her subspace transceiver: I want this bitch dead. For good, this time."

Sonja pulled out her tricorder, emitting a broad spectrum jamming field. The Queen looked at Ron, pleading for him to help.

Ron simply pulled out one of the MG42s and opened fire. Her body was shredded and melted away, while the remaining Borg drones quickly began dropping like flies as well, short-circuiting with the loss of their queen, collapsing to the ground. The two holding Yang fell down - and the woman wasted no time running towards Blake as she ripped off her restraints. "Blake!"

She groaned, looking up at Yang. "Yang… kill me."

"While I would grant your request, the young woman would object." Yang fired a single shot at Ron, whose shields simply defused it. "Thank God for PSGs."

"How the hell are you even down here?" Ron slung the MG42 over his back before approaching the pair.

"Get away from her!"

"Relax." He gently shoved Yang aside before he extended his tubules into her neck.

Yang began to move, but Jaden put a hand on her shoulder. "Hang on," he said. "He's trying to help her - trust him."

Ron closed his eyes, Blake following suit before both spoke in tandem. "Implant creation at 32%. Energy field slowing progress. All vital implants integrated into nervous and circulatory systems. Cranial implants are at 20% creation." Ron opened his eyes. "Damn it, it's already gone too far."

"What?"

"I was hoping I could stop it before it got to the point where the implants couldn't be removed without killing her. But we're at that point, WAY past that point."

"So she's like you now?" Takeshi asked. "Well, in regards to being a liberated drone who can't return to being fully human… or fully Faunus in her case."

"Yes."

Moaning was heard from some of the now former drones. Ruby approached one, Crescent Rose deployed.

A woman drone opened her one eye, landing on Ruby's form. "W-What happened to me? I can't feel my arm. Why can't I feel my arm?!"

"Calm down."

"My eye! I can't see! What happened to my eye?!" Ruby looked at her left arm, finding some Borg attachment in its' place, and her right eye had some form of optic instead of another eye.

All around them, various Remnant natives were coming to in similar states - some were missing both eyes, some were missing both arms, some were missing legs…

Takeshi looked at Ron. "Well… on the one hand, we managed to free a lot of people from the Borg today," he said. "On the other…"

Ron simply cradled Blake's unconscious form. And PTSD just kicked RIGHT IN. 5 years ago, those people were him.

He was reliving it. "We're not getting anything out of him today. We need to beam these people to the Ra Cailum and blow the facility."

"What?!" Ironwood walked over to the pair, confused and angry. "The Borg are cleared out! We can just reclaim the—"

"No, we can't," Takeshi replied. "General. If we left one scrap of Borg technology here, the nanites would remain. And if someone did something wrong, they would activate and the whole situation would happen all over again. Only the odds are we would have moved on to our next stop by then, and the planet would be doomed. Trust us, General. It's for the best if we just completely demolish the place, our way."

Ironwood looked at all the people, then at Ron, who simply clutched at Blake tighter. The asshole was actually worth pitying now.

"Do it."

Luna gestured to Annette. "Set up the pattern enhancers. As soon as they're up, I'll get the signal booster and we'll beam out."

Annette looked at Ron, whose stare was beginning to remind her of soldiers from World War One. The man was broken, being forced to look at what he had become.

It made her want to be there for him all the more. "R… right," she said. "Sonja, ma'am, would you mind giving me a hand?"

"Yeah, you'll need me to set up the grid." Annette grabbed two enhancers, setting them up in far corners of the room.

Luna sighed as she looked at Ron. "Was he like this when he was freed?"

"I think he was violent, first. We'll have to ask Rutia when we beam up."

Yang evenutally pried Blake from Ron's arms. "The fuck happened to him? I only see Uncle Qrow doing this."

"Ra Cailum _to ground team. Come in, ground team._ "

Takeshi tapped his commbadge. "Ground team here. Most of the Borg have been dealt with, but we have a whole lot of liberated drones, now. Need Transporter evac, and we'll need torpedoes to properly demo the place."

"Neutron/omicron warheads prepped. Will the… Captain be returning?" Takeshi looked at Ron, who stared at the wall. "He'll be first up. He's… I think the old phrase was shell shock."

"Understood, sir." Luna pulled off her commbadge, tagging Blake. "You'll be first up. Ra Cailum, energize."

Ron, Yang and Blake disappeared in showers of light. "We'll stay down here, work on getting everyone out of here."

Marcus looked at the former drones. "Gah. This is just plain wrong. At least fighting the Locust, you were fighting inhuman monsters. The Borg… I feel wrong."

"Yeah, it can feel that way," Takeshi remarked. "But… I have to admit that this is a new one on me, and as close to a best-case scenario as one can get when it comes to freeing people from the Borg. Normally you're lucky if you can free just one individual."

Marcus stared at the spot where Ron sat. "Yeah. I'll go look for the survivors, if we left any."

* * *

 **USS Ra Cailum - sickbay**

* * *

Blake groaned as her eyes opened.

"How do you feel?" The faunus looked at Rutia Yulanra, who looked bored.

'Yulanra, Rutia, formerly Rutia Falarie, joined Trill, host to Yulanra symbiont. Starfleet rank, full commander. Assignment: USS Ra Cailum, NCC-94517-A, Odyssey-Class superdreadnought. Previous assignments: USS Requiem, NCC-54758, Miranda-Class, as cadet first officer, USS Ra Cailum, NCC-94517, Sovereign-Class as chief medical officer. And how do I know that?'

"Let me guess: Ron stuck you with his tubules."

Blake gave a brief nod. "Yeah… I… he wanted to help… and I think I lost consciousness as soon as he did."

"He had to overwrite the Borg programming and that meant that he had to overlay some of his OS into your new cybernetics. Unfortunately, that means you had a transfer of memories, as well."

Blake blinked, trying to sort through them. "Trust me, he had the same fucking problem on the Requiem: he had the memories of thousands of people in his brain. Still does. At least you don't have that fight-or-flight thing going on."

"Fight-or-flight?" Blake asked. "I take it his situation was… different?"

"There was a grenade involved. And he fought the Borg until he was taken."

"You fucking bastards want me? You're going to have to fucking work for it!" Blake shook her head, rubbing her temples. Where did that memory come from?

"Take a nap. Thankfully, you are the LEAST of my problems: the boss did most of the work for me. I'll give you a checkup later. And I don't think the captain would mind you hijacking his quarters for a nap." Rutia shook her head in pity. "Not like he's going to need the bed for a while."

Blake paused, but decided it wasn't worth asking. "Alright," she said. "I… I'll do that."

She went to the exit, seemingly knowing the ship as well as anyone else.

She knew why. The doors opened, and outside them waited Yang. "Blake!" She threw her arms around the Faunus girl, hugging her.

" _I am your brother and I'll be damned if I let anything harm you, Lunamaria_."

She shook her head. "Sorry!"

"It's fine, just… side effects of what the captain had to do to me. Apparently, I have… some of his memories."

"Explains why that holographic bitch escorted him to his ready room. He must be reliving everything that happened in your head."

Blake gave a hesitant nod. "Possibly… and it probably brought up his own memories of being assimilated, too. That can't be easy to deal with."

"Well, the way you reacted, it's… not exactly pretty. We got a room on Deck 7: it's a four-bunk room."

"Actually, I'd like to go to Deck 4. It's the captain's quarters. He's not using them. He'll be too busy sorting through my memories to think about… anything involving a bed."

Yang blanched. "Did you just—"

"Sleep, Yang; the man's a monk when it comes to sexual relations. He's 44 and he's STILL a virgin. Information I don't want in my head, but it's stuck there."

"O… Okay…" Yang mused. "That can't be healthy, but… okay…" She looked at Blake. "Would… would you like me to keep you company?"

"I could use the company, actually. I don't want to be alone."

The pair walked into a turbolift, which took them to deck 4. Blake's feet took them to Ron's quarters, Yang being surprised by the small size. "Wow. They're… tiny. REALLY tiny. It's barely the size of my closet back at home!"

"Ron didn't need much," Blake informed. "He doesn't keep too many belongings."

"Why not?"

"He keeps them on Earth. His homeworld, some place called… Kyoto."

Yang looked at the bed, which was actually the largest thing in the room: a king-size. Yang didn't understand why: he didn't have a girlfriend, wasn't married—

"He has nightmares. He tosses and turns in the night."

The blonde looked at Blake. "What?"

"You were looking at the bed and wondering why he has it this size. He tosses and turns in the night: his nightmares are that bad. And I don't know how I knew you were thinking that."

"Pinkerton's a master of psychological warfare. Maybe he can read people and you… picked it up from him?"

"…It's as good an explanation as any," Blake replied.

Yang pulled back the covers, jumping into the bed. Blake gingerly climbed in, gripping onto Yang's shoulders and back.

"I'll see you when we wake up, Blaky." Blake narrowed her eyes before closing them, welcoming Yang's warmth.

But sleep would not be comforting.

* * *

Blake found herself on a starship, much like the Ra Cailum, but it seemed a fair bit smaller.

The doors to a room opened, and out came Ron, wearing a different uniform and with only three rank pins.

"Commander Pinkerton, to the bridge." The man yawned before he tapped his commbadge. "On my way, ma'am."

"You just got up, didn't you?"

"Yeah, I did. Put in more hours than anyone else on the tactical teams, Captain."

"You really are a workaholic," the woman replied with a bit of a grin.

Blake followed Ron as he made his way to the bridge. The trip was brief, and once she entered the bridge, she noticed a plaque near the lift.

USS Tempest, NX-90024

Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. - Wendell Phillips

This was the captain's last assignment before taking command of the Ra Cailum.

…the last day he was ever truly human.

She didn't know why, but that realization filled her with apprehension.

"Captain, I just lost my link to Starfleet's comm network."

The woman in the center chair looked at Ron. "Did you overstress the comm system during your drills?"

"Negative, Captain: we overhauled the comms afterwards. Something's jamming us. A multi-adaptive comms jammer. Nice job. Haven't seen this outside my mother's ship, the Damascus."

Blake watched. If she was right…

"Ma'am, I'm detecting a ship, bearing 084 mark 4, distance—"

The Tempest rocked, dropping out of warp. "Fuck! Captain—"

"Watch your mouth, Pinkerton, or—"

The comm buzzed. "We are the Borg. Lower your shields and surrender your ship. Your technological and biological distinctiveness will be added to our own. You will be assimilated into the Collective. Resistance is Futile."

Blake shivered. That was not something you ever wanted to hear.

"Oh my God. The Borg."

"I thought Janeway killed them!"

The captain looked back at one of her subordinates. "So did I. stand to battlestations!"

"This is the XO: all hands, grab a gun! We're under attack by the Borg! Repeat—" The ship rocked from multiple weapons impacting the shields. "Ron?"

"Shields are weakening, but I've got them on a randomized rotating modulation. Their tractor beams are holding firmly against the hull—" The Tempest rocked again, and breen swirls of light deposited several Borg drones onto the bridge. Ron used his phaser rifle like a club, batting one over the head and killing it before firing at the drones.

Blake watched, realizing that even before Ron's assimilation, he was a force to be reckoned with as he hit drone after drone.

"I see your combat classes actually do something, Commander!" Another drone, a tactical, beamed in, firing at Ron, but the human got in close, punching it in the face before breaking its' arm and forcing it to the deck, right before breaking its' neck.

"I see that you actually know what you're doing."

"The bastards are probably all over the ship by now, ma'am."

"Probably," the woman replied. "We need to get a message off to Starfleet somehow."

"If we can beam over to the Borg ship, we can take out its' subspace systems and get off a warning. I can rig the phaser rifles to a random fractal modulation, something the Borg can't adapt to."

"And if we get assimilated?"

"Not to worry. The rifles are designed to autodestruct should anything unbecoming happen to them, and I've programmed the computer to erase EVERYTHING on the remodulator. I don't even know how to make the program!"

She smiled. "You're paranoid."

"No, that's my mother."

The woman smiled brighter. "You have a unique sense of humor, Commander," she said. "Then again, that's part of why I like you." She leaned in and gave his cheek a quick peck.

Ron blinked. "Huh?"

"You're also an idiot."

The bridge crew were too busy trying not to shit their pants before she took a rifle out of the locker. Ron added the remodulator, then activated both weapons.

"I object to you coming with me, Captain."

"You need backup. So I'm going with you. Hold the ship until the Commander and I get back! I want to go back to Starfleet Command saying that we encountered the Borg and won!"

"Yes, Ma'am!" the crew replied, and Blake felt a pang of grief, given that such a loyal and hardworking crew and gifted captain were about to be lost.

The two beamed out, rematerializing on the cube.

"The layout's not the same as cubes Voyager's encountered."

"Doesn't matter, Captain. Borg shit's all the same when blown up. All I care about is where is it and how do we kill it?"

A number of Borg approached them, Ron firing several bolts that killed the normal drones.

Blake watched as the two continued to fight against the Drones, until one snuck up on the Captain from behind and injected her with assimilation tubules.

"NATARLE!" He killed another drone, then killed the one that got his captain.

"Ron…"

"Nattie, don't talk. I'll try to get those damn things out."

"Don't… bother. Just… shoot me."

Ron looked at her, almost glaring into her soul. "No."

"Ron…" the captain - Natarle - moaned. "I… You were… a good officer… a… a good friend… I… I always hoped that… there could… be something more… between us…"

She handed him her rifle. "Don't let me end up like them."

Ron set the phaser rifle to disruption, though he did it with trembling hands. "Nattie, don't make me do this."

"Commander Pinkerton, I'm ordering you to kill me, goddamn it!"

Ron screamed as he fired, Natarle's eyes glassing over.

"I love you… Ron…" Her body stilled.

The commander stood up, then roared as the Borg approached. "You fucking bastards want me? You're going to have to fucking work for it!" He opened fire, screaming at them.

Blake watched the whole thing. She watched as the Borg advanced, unrelentingly, dropping one after another as they drew steadily closer, to the point where they were even climbing over the dead bodies to get to him.

Eventually, however, they _did_ get to him.

A drone that was once a member of the crew injected him with nanoprobes, but he fought on. The bastard didn't stop, didn't rest until they finally began taking over his body. That took 90 seconds, and he set the phaser rifles to overload. Two drones took them away; after all, why waste such a valuable drone?

She then watched as his assimilation began, and as the Borg took more and more of his body and replaced it with machines.

The Borg cut his head open, then discovered that his body was actually doubly redundant: each half of his brain could run just as well without the other. So they removed the right half and put in a copy of some android named 'Data's'. All while his mind was fully active.

They tortured him. And then...

Nothing.

* * *

Blake's eyes snapped open and she jolted to a sitting position, her eyes frantically glancing around her.

"Blake, what's wrong?"

"They… they tortured him. MUTILATED HIM. He was bad before, but the borg made it worse! The man's insanity was caused by the borg! When they took out half of his brain!"

Yang looked sick. "His brain."

"Yes! Apparently his body was redundant enough that the two halves of his brain could function independently, so they took one out and stuck a computer brain in its place!"

Yang actually ran out of the bed and into the tiny bathroom, puking. "Ok, what ELSE did they do?"

"His heart, lungs, liver, his right eye, his skeleton's been strengthened with tritanium, his muscles turned into overpowered monsters—"

"OK, I think I get the picture," Yang replied, puking some more. "Geez… they were really thorough, weren't they?"

"More so than any Borg drone. Usually, they take out an eye, take off an arm. But this? This was more extensive. They ripped out 70% of his organic body and installed machine analogues!"

Blake's book the night she met them, about the man with two souls… it could not have been more prophetic.

Ron was the man with two souls: his and the Borg Queen. They fought for control, and while he won, he had suffered for it.

Yang finally came out of the bathroom. "Are you… no, I doubt you're alright after seeing that…" she said.

"No, I'm not. But now… Now I can understand him. He's afraid. He's afraid for everyone and it's made him turn to the madness that the Borg created for him. He cultivated it and turned it into a weapon of mass destruction to use against everyone that wants to hurt him and his loved ones. He doesn't want to lose anyone else."

"So he lashes out, driving people crazy?"

"In a way… yes."

Overprotective, terrified, unwilling to let anyone be hurt?

If it wasn't for the bigger man and the insanity, Yang could almost describe that as Ruby.

"Well, that's a thing…" Yang remarked. "Blake, I… you want me to hold you for a bit?"

"Shut up and hug me, damn it." Yang obeyed, holding the Faunus in her arms.

"And now she's taking in my inflections." Both turned to the door, finding Ron, highly disheveled, standing there. The man looked like he hadn't slept in days. "I'm not going to stop you. You want to hold each other, go ahead. If anything, I could use the reassurance that love still exists in the multiverse."

"Captain…" Blake began. "I… I saw the day you were assimilated in my dreams."

"My condolences."

"You had to kill your captain. Your crew. I just watched. But—"

"Do not make excuses for me, Miss Belladonna, I live with my guilt every day. It's why, the day after I woke up after I was rescued, I tried to resign my commission with Starfleet Command. I had no right to wear this uniform. I still don't. But as for the Borg… I have closure. I ended a threat to your world that I brought by accident."

"Admiral Quinn—"

"Was desperate. He needed command-level officers. In spite of my many failures, he promoted me."

"Well, you had to have done something right to get a ship like this," Yang remarked, continuing to hold Blake comfortingly, though she almost wished Ron wasn't around so she could hold Blake closer…

"The only thing I did was garner the respect of the Romulans. 'If he's not in your fleet, we want nothing to do with the Federation'. I don't even know what I did!"

"You did your job. And you did it better than anyone. That's your family's gift, captain. To bond under fire. Enemies, allies, it doesn't matter. No matter what you get their respect and they fight with you, by your side. I'm surprised the Dominion hasn't sent a request to join the Federation by now."

Ron scoffed. "No one's that lucky. I'll be asking for my quarters back tomorrow; I need to deal with Ironwood." The captain left, looking every bit the 40 year old he was before the doors shut.

Yang sighed. "He doesn't really hold a high opinion of himself, does he?" she asked.

"He blames himself for the Tempest, the Iconian war, what happened to the last Ra Cailum... Larcei... All the people he left behind on Sera, the destruction of an entire solar system..."

"Yeeeeeah, that's a lot."

"All of which happened on his watch."

"I can certainly see his point… doesn't mean he sells himself short," Yang remarked. She smiled. "Don't fall into that same kind of trap, okay, Blake? I don't want you to wallow in any kind of misery or sorrow." She then laid a gentle kiss on Blake's cheek.

Blake simply snuggled into Yang's arms.

* * *

Ruby and Weiss sat next to each other in the room they'd been given. It had been meant for Team RWBY as a whole, but Yang had let them know she and Blake would be in Ron's quarters for the night.

"That was quite a fight, wasn't it?" Weiss asked, placing an arm around Ruby.

"Yeah. Just… wrong. We were fighting people. They couldn't control themselves."

"I'll admit, that makes it… morally ambiguous. But we made the right choice. I… talked with some of the White Fang people. They were… nice. They said 'now we understand'. They're as scared of us as most people are of them."

"Yeah… that does make a bit of sense," Ruby replied, scooting closer to Weiss. "And… I have to thank you."

"For what?"

"For making me promise to be careful. For giving me a reason to follow through with it. And… for helping me realize just how much you mean to me."

The two cuddled on a bed, smiling. They had been holding one another for almost an hour, not giving a damn.

And why should they? The day was saved, they had admitted they were in love with one another and they were among the first people from Remnant to have contact with aliens, and to go into space!

"You're welcome, Ruby…" Weiss replied, before kissing her partner again.

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: So cute!**

 **Ron the True Fan: Yes. It is. (Bumblebee buzzes past head to land on a white rose) Well, THAT'S very descriptive of the romantic situation.**

 **Ruby: Isn't that called...uh...**

 **Weiss: A RWBY poly relationship is normally called Pollination. This is _not_ one of those stories.**

 **Takeshi Yamato: No, it isn't - but it is a White Rose and a Bumblebee story.**

 **And as for what happens after that last kiss? Well, let's just say it's not suited for a T-rated Fic and leave it at that.**

 **Blake: You turned me into a Borg.**

 **Ron the True Fan: Eh, you're not fully Borg. Not as Borg as— (Blocks strike from Yang with Lancer) I thought you learned your lesson from last time.**

 **Yang: Oh, I did. But that was fun. (Ace of Spades starts playing)**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Are you a masochist, Yang, or are you like Zaraki?**

 **117Jorn: I think she's just battle hungry.**

 **Ron the True Fan: And I'll provide a feast! Get us started on the next one! I'll be there as soon as I'm free!**

 **Ja Ne!**


	37. Chapter 37

**USS Ra Cailum, orbit of Remnant**

* * *

 _Captain's log, USS_ Ra Cailum _, stardate 91165.6: the Borg situation on Remnant has been contained, as per Code Baka protocols. According to Cassie and Sonja, however, we have another problem, just as bad as the Borg._

* * *

"Massive explosion, visible for miles—"

"It was like nothing we've ever seen!"

"An entire town was wiped out!"

Cassie groaned. "Who was the idiot who decided that protocol needed a photon torpedo?"

"That idiot would be Ron. He wanted to make sure nothing survived. Especially him."

"Lucky for us Takeshi and Luna were there to keep him from suiciding," Cassie replied. "Still… I don't think we're going to be able to cover this up."

"Ron and Take are in the ready room right now. Won't that be a fun talk."

* * *

"Well, we're screwed."

Takeshi chuckled. "Yeah, we are."

"Just ONCE I would like something to go smoothly. No hitchups, no bullshit, just a simple, clean operation, no directives violated, no one losing lives. Instead, I have 5500 people to bury."

"And our secrecy has been blown wide open," Takeshi remarked. "I've heard from both Ozpin and Ironwood that the Vale and Atlas councils are demanding answers, and while they're trying to keep it quiet, it's not working. I think we may need to say 'screw the Prime Directive' and go public, Ron."

"Just so you know, when Starfleet Command gets these reports, I AM blaming you. I'm tempted to just pack up and leave, jump to the next universe."

"And avoid responsibility?"

"Don't even START with that, Takeshi. You sleep around with Luna every chance you get and leave ME with all the paperwork."

Takeshi sighed. "You may have a point there, Ron, but even if we were to just up and leave, we'd have to take all the Liberated Borg we managed to save with us - and that's a lot of humans and Faunus just uprooted from their families. And in the case of Blake, you know she wouldn't come alone - where one member of Team RWBY goes, the rest follow." He sighed. "And you've seen the racism down there - there's a lot of people who don't deserve that. Ron, I know you don't like this, but if you don't go public, I _will_."

"I said tempted, you idiot. Unlike you, I don't exactly run away from what I need to do."

"You're never leaving the paperwork thing alone, are you?"

Ron looked back at Takeshi as he faced the window looking out over Remnant. "When you get your own command one day, you're not going to be able to pass it off to anyone else. If we were back home, I'd talk Starfleet Command, get their opinion and act on it. But we're not back home."

He took in a breath. "So I can't pass it up the chain of command. I'm the _top_ of the chain. So no, I'm going to do it. First thing's first..." He tapped his commbadge. "Pinkerton to Ptolemy."

" _Go ahead, Ron._ "

"Drop the cloak."

* * *

In orbit of Remnant, a rippling effect was seen as one starship after another appeared over the planet - the _Ra Cailum_ first, then the Battlestars, then the UNSC ships, and every other ship in the fleet.

Within seconds, they were all visible. And pandemonium reigned on Remnant.

* * *

"This is crazy—there's a FLEET of them up there!"

"This is Lisa Lavender for VNN: a massive number of ships just appeared over Vale! As in SPACESHIPS! We have telescopes confirming!"

Sonja looked at Luna, honestly curious. "So… the fuck is the boss thinkin?"

"Why ask me?"

"You're his sister. Take a hint."

"Well… if I had to guess, I'd say he's decided we may as well go public - next step would likely be to make a general announcement across all their comm channels or meet with one of their ruling councils."

Ron then exited the ready room, Takeshi hot on his heels. "Cassie, tap into the CCT network."

"Aye, sir."

"Corpsa, hack into every comm channel you can: military, civilian, private, whatever. It's time we introduced ourselves to Remnant."

"Yes, Boss," Corpsa replied.

Luna glanced at Sonja. "Told ya."

* * *

Velvet kept trying to contact Ruby and RWBY, but she kept getting no signal.

"Anything today, bun?"

Velvet almost glared at Coco for the reminder of her Faunus heritage, as a result of Ron forcing her to realize that she needed to stand up for herself (he was a dick, but he actually _cared_ in his own way) but it was Coco, so she shook off the urge. "No, nothing. It's like their scrolls don't even exist!"

Fox held his own scroll up, then pantomimed something coming towards it and dropping away before it got there.

"A system-wide call?" Coco pulled out her own scroll before an image appeared. It was the new teacher.

"Greetings to the people of Remnant. My name is Ronald Pinkerton, commanding officer of the United Federation of Planets Starship Ra Cailum. My fleet and I mean no harm, although harm has clearly been done, if indirectly."

Velvet's eyes were wide. "He… he's from outer space?" she asked in a whisper.

"That ain't possible."

"I am human, as you've gathered, but I am but one of 14 species within the fleet above your world. Most of them are crewmen on my ship. The incident in Atlas was the result of an over cautious man attempting to safeguard his home, but failing to understand the dangers. My XO will explain further."

Takeshi came onto the screen next. "Hello, Remnant," he said. "I am Takeshi Yamato, executive officer of the Ra Cailum. A few weeks ago, Ron and I came down to Remnant covertly to take a look. Rest assured, we weren't planning an invasion - our fleet is lost a long way from home, and we have encountered one crisis after another on our journey to find a way back. We were hopeful we could enjoy some rest and recreation on your world, but knowing our luck on these matters, we wanted to check the situation first."

Yatsuhashi searched Takeshi's face for anything showing that he was lying. But Takeshi sucked at lying.

"We transported down to Vale, being accepted as teachers at Beacon Academy. During a combat class, my commanding officer was cut, his blood ending up on the ground. For most, this wouldn't be a problem. But Ron is not normal."

Velvet looked to Coco for answers. "What's he talking about?"

"I have no idea, though it might be related to what happened with JNPR that resulted in that cut," Coco remarked.

"In our home, one of the greatest threats we face is a group of cybernetic zombies known as the Borg," Takeshi explained. "They have a hive-mind consciousness, and exist to assimilate all life and technology into their collective. On occasion, we can liberate individuals from the collective, allowing them to regain their individuality and return to society. Ron is one such individual, though most of the cybernetic implants they inflicted him with couldn't be removed, including nanomachines in his bloodstream."

"What? He beat us—"

"The blood was taken by General Ironwood to Atlas. In his defense, he didn't know. But when he brought the blood there, the nanoprobes began to assimilate. Everyone and thing was taken and turned into… these."

The image turned from Takeshi and Ron to… a nightmare image - countless people, Humans and Faunus, all covered with machines, some even having completely mechanical arms and legs. Velvet could feel her lunch threatening to come back up at the sight of what had to be a Faunus with mechanical apparatus where their animal ears would be.

"The Borg were defeated here, though it took destroying the settlement to do it. If ONE nanoprobe was left intact, they would have begun assimilating again. In contacting you, I have violated Starfleet's highest law: the Prime Directive, which forbids us from interfering in the affairs of a civilization that has not achieved faster-than-light travel. But we had no choice."

Fox wasn't the only one silent now, as they just gazed at their scrolls, transfixed by the message.

"Starfleet Command can kiss my ass: I'm doing the right thing. If that means I lose my commission…fuck em. I'll be down there in a few minutes to talk to the respective councils of your world. Ra Cailum Actual out."

The image cut out, and things were perfectly silent for a moment or two. "I… I wonder if that's where Ruby and her team are…?" Velvet wondered. "Up there… on one of those spaceships?"

"Probably."

A moment later, a shape appeared in the clouds, descending from above. It was a large, boxy craft with two nacelles on the sides, which then banked around the city, showing off the writing on the sides: 01 United Federation of Planets Starship USS Ra Cailum shuttlecraft Ra-Horakhty.

"Well, when he said a few minutes, he wasn't kidding," Coco remarked.

The craft flew over the city, then went straight for Beacon.

* * *

"You just like showing this thing off, don't you?"

"Compared to those pieces of shit you like flying, Takeshi, this thing is a work of art."

Takeshi sighed. "Well, at least you don't have the Destroyer of Shuttles at the controls," he said. "That'd be a _great_ first impression - in the ground."

The shuttle touched down at Beacon, the rear hatch opening up. "Ok, boys and girls, enjoy your day at school!" A round from Yang hit Ron in the head. "Testy."

After learning Ron was everything proof, she decided to shoot at him every time he was an ass.

That was all the time. Teams RWBY and JNPR departed the Ra-Horakhty, which took off seconds later.

Ruby continued to stare at the craft. "No."

"Oh, come on, don't tell me you weren't interested in taking that thing for a spin," Ruby retorted.

"That's Captain Pinkerton's personal shuttlecraft. The same one he killed over fifty Tal Shiar agents to get back. And painted it in their own blood to prove a point. Believe me, Ruby, that is the LAST shuttle you want to touch."

"…How do you know that, Blake?"

"When he went and stopped the assimilation process there was… a little bleedthrough. I got his memories, and I think he got at least some of mine," Blake informed.

"Ew."

"It's not that bad. Although his mother would scare anyone to death. She's a nice woman once you get to know her."

"Ruby!" Team CFVY ran into the grounds, rushing towards the two missing teams.

"Velvet!" Ruby called back. "Good to see you!"

"We were worried! When you disappeared…" Velvet looked at Blake, who had one of Ron's classic 'fuck with me, you die' faces. "You… what happened to you, Blake?"

"I had thousands of microscopic machines injected into my body, adding implants and technologies beyond anything Remnant would even imagine, had my mind temporarily linked to a hive mind of over 6000 people and in order to stop it, Captain Pinkerton had to link his mind to mine and I saw the worst day of his life, what made him what he is. Does THAT answer your question, Miss Scarlatina?"

Velvet's eyes widened. "Y… yeah, it does…" she said. "So… we saw Captain Pinkerton's speech to all of Remnant earlier… does that mean you were…?"

"She was," Yang said. "We went there to help stop it, but Blake and I were separated from the rest, and they tried assimilating her - thankfully the Captain was able to stop it, but…"

"I'm a freak of nature, just like he is. If you excuse me." Blake left, heading for the dorms.

"What happened to her?"

"She watched a man get his brains scooped out and turned into a robot with fleshy parts. Trust me, I puked hearing about it. She relived it. Every freaking second of it. She'll be fine."

"You're sure?"

Yang looked Coco in the eye. "I can vouch for my partner, thank you VERY much."

Coco raised her hands placatingly. "Alright," she said. "I'll trust you. I kinda hope you can fill us in on some of the less nasty details, though." She glanced at Ruby and Weiss, before whispering to Yang, "Such as why your sister and her partner have been holding hands ever since we got here."

"They're dating. That simple."

"What."

"I don't know the details, but they kissed in front of me a few times. They don't care who watches."

Coco looked back at Weiss and Ruby, who walked off, letting go only when necessary. "Huh."

"Apparently, the asshole believes in romance. He even left me and Blake alone in his quarters while he sulked in his ready room."

Coco smiled. "Well, anyone who believes in romance isn't a complete asshole, I think," she said. "Anyway, come on, we should probably catch you up on what happened here while you were gone."

* * *

Ron adjusted his red jacket, wearing the fancy KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN! Era uniform. He even yelled it as soon as the clasp was fixed, much to Alpha Team's amusement.

It was VERY yell-worthy.

Takeshi grinned, wearing his Odyssey Dress Uniform. "That movie's one of your favorites from the XCOM universes, isn't it?" he asked.

"It's the yell. Do it. Yell that name, and try to tell me it's not… DAMN awesome to yell."

Takeshi sighed, then screamed "KHAAAAAAAAAAAN!" The echo made him smile. "Yeah, you're right. It's worth it."

"Told you. Now, Ozpin, you said both Councils would meet with us in Vale for ease and speed?"

"Yes," Ozpin replied. "We should be able to handle it, but be ready to deal with all manner of accusations - they can be… difficult to deal with at the best of times, which this is not."

"Not a problem. If they're stupid, I'll just explain it to them." The craft landed at the council building, Ron getting out of his seat. "Gentlemen, I suggest you go first."

"And why?"

"To distract the snipers."

Takeshi facepalmed. "Smartass."

The two men exited the side hatch first, followed by Ron, Luna and Takeshi, the former waving at the snipers on the roof before they entered the building.

* * *

"The Attack on Atlas was clearly their fault!" The Atlas representative shouted, sitting in the chambers where the representatives from Vale, Vacuo and Mistral also sat - awaiting for the representatives from 'Starfleet' to arrive. "They are dangerous!"

"They said it themselves, Councilor." The Vale rep said, "It was an accident - not an attack."

"Yet over 5000 people are dead!"

"Do you people honestly think if I WANTED to do it…" Their attention turned to the door, which opened and allowed the five to enter. "That I would actually bother to come down and take responsibility for my actions?! If I wanted to, I could have stayed in orbit, being a threatening son of a bitch with weapons beyond your comprehension or ability to defend against. But instead… I'm here. Talking to you, face to face."

The two Councils and the reps of the other two looked at the man. "Yeah, didn't think of that, did you? I am here to talk, to tell you the truth and show you what would have happened if we didn't do what we did."

The Atlas representative growled, however the Vacuo rep shrugged "From what you've shown us already, we have a good idea." He said. "Well… I know this may seem rather late, but… welcome to Remnant, Captain."

"Thank you, sir. My apologies for the deception, but as I said before, we have a strict rule of non-interference with any society. Unless necessary, the Prime Directive must never be violated. But what we did is beyond any sort of excuse. While there are survivors, they can never return home, and I am VERY sorry to say that."

"Because of the technology in their bodies." The Mistral Rep said.

"Yes, ma'am. One nanoprobe is enough to destroy a civilization. And I actually planned to die in the explosions that destroyed that town. I know what threat I pose when the technology in my body is outside my control."

"I am going to assume the technology you possess is… irremovable?" the Vale representative asked.

"If it is removed, I die. My heart, lungs… 70% of my body was replaced by the Borg. I will never be fully human ever again. And if you decide to charge me with the destruction of the town and all the deaths… Then I place myself in your hands."

They stared at the captain. He made no excuses, no deflections.

He put himself up for judgement.

"I personally don't blame you," the Vale representative said. "Though if you honestly want to atone for what happened… perhaps we could get some extra security for the Vytal festival?"

"If this is your way of asking for help, I can provide a neutral venue. The Ra Cailum is the most secure place in the known universe; you can hold your festival on board, if you wish."

"Your ship is large, but… it can't hold that many people."

"Maximum population is just under one hundred thousand, but that can be lessened by sending some of my own crew for R&R, which was the whole point of us beaming down: to see if it WAS safe."

"It is certainly a tempting offer," the Vale representative remarked. "We will need to discuss it among ourselves for a bit."

Ron nodded, the councils dismissing him and his staff to talk to Ozpin.

"Ron…"

"Yes, Luna?"

"Has anyone told you that your ability to dodge bullets of EVERY kind gets really annoying at times?"

"She's right," Takeshi added. "Then again, it's also a good thing, since it means you get to keep doing what you do best, and I don't need to take over on a job that I doubt I could handle."

"It's a family gift. Could be worse. That talk I had with Blake before we left, for example. Worst talk I've ever had."

* * *

 **One hour earlier - USS Ra Cailum**

* * *

Ron signed yet another of Takeshi's PADDs (Ron SWORE he'd get back at his XO for this) before the door chimed. "Come in." The doors opened, allowing Blake Belladonna to enter his ready room, bow missing from her head.

He knew and didn't care; what was the point?

"Captain," Blake said, taking a seat.

"Blake, I'm sorry for getting you up. Unfortunately, we don't have the luxury of time, so I'll cut through it: you are as big a threat to Remnant as the Borg were in that city. Meaning, you and I have two choices, both of which fucking suck. One, you die."

Blake sighed. "And about the only way to properly do that would be to throw myself out an airlock and drop into Remnant's atmosphere without a suit, burning up from re-entry. Not exactly the easiest way to go."

"The other method… you come with us. But you'll never come back to Remnant. Again, both options fucking suck."

"Because you would be taking me away from my friends. My family. And you don't want to do that."

Ron nodded. "I don't tear people apart from their homes. The COG wanted to leave Sera, the XCOM people joined us willingly… I have to give your world a chance."

Blake nodded. "I… I probably will come with you. Alternatives aside, a cross-dimensional journey would be better than continuing to deal with racism on Remnant."

"What about your team?"

"I'll… tell them when the time comes."

"Give them a choice, Blake. That's not an order, just a suggestion. But I would act on it."

* * *

 **Current Time - Beacon Dorms**

* * *

Blake stood by her bed, having just finished packing the last of her belongings, not that she had many.

There were a few things she'd miss from Remnant - future entries in the _Ninjas of Love_ series, for one - but she honestly felt she was going to have a better life among the fleet. She wouldn't have to deal with racism anymore, and the White Fang wouldn't be able to go after her.

The faunus sighed. Team RWBY was about to fall apart.

"Going somewhere?"

She jumped at the sound of Yang's voice, spinning around to find her standing in the room. "How long—"

"Long enough. Again, going somewhere? Because I don't think I gave you permission to leave me behind, Blake. Where you go, I go, remember?"

Blake sighed. "Are you sure, Yang? If you go with me, you'll be leaving Remnant behind. For good."

"I do. You know what? I don't fucking care. I read through some of Ron's logs—don't give me that look, I know you did too. They have a fun time of things. They travel the stars, searching for people, building things. They protect people. That's all I care about."

Blake's eyes and ears drooped. Yang cared way too much.

"Besides, these guys get into trouble, same with you. Mixing you two together? BAD combination. So I'm coming along."

Blake sighed again, but it was partly from relief, as well. "Th… thank you, Yang…" she said. "I… I'd worried I'd be going into this alone… having you with me… means a lot."

THUD!

Both girls looked to the door, finding Weiss on top of a fallen Ruby. "Uh… Hi, Yang!"

"How long have you two been standing there?" Ruby looked at her girlfriend of less than two days, then to her sister.

Weiss decided to deflect using technicalities. "We haven't been standing here, per se—"

"How long were you listening in?"

"Uh… the entire time? We're all on the same team! We have the right to be worried!"

Blake sighed again. "I assume the two of you want to come along, too?" she asked.

"Team RWBY sticks together!"

Weiss got off of Ruby, sighing. "Blake, I thought we told you at the docks. We are not letting you run away from us anymore. We stick together. Whether here on Remnant or on board the Ra Cailum. We're not leaving you to face this alone."

Blake started crying, breaking down before giving Weiss a hug. "Hey! I'm not Ruby!"

"Let her hug you, Weiss: my kitty's emotionally compromised. She needs the hug."

Ruby smiled. "I'm glad you two got together, Yang, Blake."

"Hey, the Feds don't discriminate and neither do I. That's purr-fect for me."

"Oh, boy."

"Come on, that was clawsome!"

"Yang, please shut up before I ask Ron to cut your hair. As in buzz it off."

Yang looked aghast. Ruby giggled.

It was nice to know the team would be sticking together, even if there were a few things that would be different.

* * *

The blue flag of the United Federation of Planets flew over a small building in Vale, showing off the humble embassy of the Ra Cailum fleet.

And it was vandalism-proof: couldn't set it on fire, draw on it… you get the idea.

"Well, I fully expect a mob of people here in a week, demanding we solve all of Remnant's problems in a day."

"Either that or people wanting to join us to escape Remnant's problems," Takeshi remarked. "I wouldn't put it past our luck."

"It sucks. Period. Half the Atlas council wants my head, the other half wants to make me part of their military and the other councils want to see what the Ra Cailum can do for their world. Times like this I hate being part of Starfleet."

"But you wouldn't leave."

"Hell no. The civilian market would want me back in the service in a day."

A knock was heard at the door to the building, Ron groaning. "It's unlocked!"

A Starfleet officer walked inside "Captain? We… have a situation."

"What is it?"

"We have a mob of Remnant citizens forming a mob near the entrance of the embassy… most of them being Faunus. Their leader wishes to speak to you."

Ron looked at Takeshi. "I fucking hate you today."

"Oh, come on!"

"You spoke, it happened. I'll deal with them." Ron got up, straightening out his uniform. "Through the gates of hell as we make our way to heaven. Primo Victoria." He walked out the door, finding a MASSIVE crowd outside. And the second they spotted him, they started yelling. "Aww, FUCK."

A figure stepped forward - this one being a Faunus male with wolf-like ears sticking out of his head. "Captain Pinkerton?"

"What's it to ya?"

"My name's Timber Storm, the people here and back home sorta… _drafted_ me to represent them… "

"What do you want? Just spit it out!"

Timber sighed, gulping. "Captain… we wish for Starfleet to get us the hell _off this planet._ "

"Ok. There's about, what, 500 people here, so—"

"Not 500, uh, Captain. Most of the Faunus want the fuck off of Remnant, like… the entire population on Minagare. And we number about… somewhere around three million."

"Three mill—The colony ships in our fleet—"

"Are mostly empty and can carry over 5 million in comfort after your modifications to their design." Timber said with a dry smirk "We read the document you gave to the Councils."

Ron groaned, cursing his want to be friendly. "We're never coming back. You DO realize this, yes? We leave, you'll never see this world again!"

"We know, and we're fine with that," Timber replied. "Honestly, Captain, between being treated as subhuman on the one hand and the White Fang on the other, we're pretty much fed up with Remnant at this point. Seeking a new future with you among the multiverse is better than staying here." He then chuckled "And… on a personal note… I always wanted to go to Space."

"Well, fuckery."

"Captain, I know it's not an answer you want, but we want a new beginning." He said, with a tired sigh. "A BETTER beginning. Please."

Ron stared impassively into the crowd, finding a woman with red hair and fox ears on her head, holding a baby.

"God fucking _damn_ you." He tapped his combadge. "Pinkerton to Ra Cailum."

"Go ahead, sir."

"I want portable transporter stations set up all over Remnant. Coordinates will be given."

"Sir?!"

"Get them ready! Pinkerton out!"

Meanwhile, Takeshi, watching from inside, facepalmed. "I have **_got_** to stop tempting Murphy…"

Timber blinked, looking at Ron. "So… does this mean…?"

"I will need you to give me locations of major settlements. I'll use them as beam out points. I'll provide transport to the locations, but I'm not using my shuttles to ferry people into space unnecessarily. If any of your people are uncomfortable about having their atoms taken apart one by one and put back together, they're not leaving this planet. Am I clear."

Ron's tone brooked no argument and that was not a question.

"O-Of course. But… why?"

"In my universe, there is a race called the Bajorans. They were conquered by the Cardassians in 2319 and were displaced across the quadrant. I'm having VERY uncomfortable flashbacks to that time."

"I… read up a bit on that," Timber said. "It's… not an unfair comparison… but unlike then however, we _want_ to leave this planet, to leave it behind - even if we never come back. We just… want something better."

"Starfleet Command is going to fucking kill me."

* * *

 **USS Ra Cailum**

* * *

"You're fucking kidding me."

Cassie shook her holographic head. "Sadly, no. We're being told to be accommodating, so… we're accommodating. Vale wants to send up a news crew to the Ra Cailum, they can send one. Take it up with Ron."

Sonja bashed her head against the console, screaming. "You realize that it was mouthing off to a news crew and starting a brawl that got me sent to the Utopia Planitia stockade, yes?"

"Yes," Cassie replied. "And above all else, we need to avoid a repeat of the Enterprise-B's shakedown."

"Shuttlecraft Ra-Horakhty incoming with VIPs. Repeat, shuttlecraft Ra-Horakhty incoming with VIPs." "Call Ron. Ask him if we can throw them out the fucking airlock." Sonja left the bridge, cursing Ron's need to make friends here.

* * *

Lisa Lavender stared out the windows of the shuttle in wonder as it flew past the Battlestars Galactica and Pegasus before going past the UNSC Saratoga.

"Ra-Horakhty, _this is_ Ra Cailum: _you have permission to dock in bay one._ "

"Copy that _Ra Cailum_ , docking in bay one."

The news reporter took a deep breath as they made their approach, glancing at the Camera man "You're getting all of this, right?" She whispered, as the Camera man gave her the thumbs up as he recorded their approach.

The shuttle entered the bay, landing with a soft thud in the saucer section shuttlebay. The side hatch opened, allowing them to exit, where a woman waited for them. "Welcome to the USS Ra Cailum. I'm Commander Sonja Henderson, chief engineering officer. I'll be your guide during the tour."

Lisa extended her hand, which Sonja dispassionately took. "Lisa Lavender, Vale News Network."

"Yeah, yeah, it's a pleasure. Look, I got a ship to maintain. Let's get this over with."

"Right," Lisa replied with a nod. "I'll be asking you some questions as we go along, if that is alright."

"As long as you don't take anything or cause us to run into an energy ribbon within the next six hours, it's fine."

Lisa blinked in confusion. "What?"

"It's an in-joke with the Federation Press Corps. This way."

Lisa nodded, dumbly, before following Sonja, her cameraman close behind.

"We're currently in the main shuttlebay of the massive spaceship—"

"STARship. Spaceships only go from planet to planet. Starships wander the stars, Miss Lavender. We take GREAT offense to that kinda shit."

"I'm sorry, Commander—"

"Stow it, you didn't know. We're on deck 9, sections 14 through 18. The Ra Cailum's main shuttlebay can hold up to 90 shuttles at a time. We're down to 60 because we had to shuffle them around the fleet, and we've got a full three wings of starfighters. Just one squadron of pilots, though. No one wanted to be assigned to a superdreadnought."

"I see," Lisa replied. "How long have you been… well… out there? Among the stars?"

"You mean the Ra Cailum or the Federation? There's a distinct difference between the two."

The crew and their escort left the bay, entering the corridors of the ship.

"B-Both, actually. Our viewers back home want to know everything there is to know about you people."

"Well, the Federation's been around for about, oh, two hundred and fifty years, I think," Sonja informed. "As for us? The ship's been in service for about four or five years."

"Five years?"

"Close to; the original Ra Cailum was a smaller ship: Sovereign-Class. About 400 meters shorter, less than a one-fifth the mass. She was destroyed when Empress Sela decided to ram her ship into us, but we got the last laugh when we slammed the Ra Cailum into her ship. Shame the Iconians took her ship away. I would have LOVED to see the look on the Imperial dockworkers that had to fix that."

"In Atlas, a man who loses their ship normally doesn't get a new one. How did the captain get his hands on this… monster?"

Sonja looked at Lisa, then at the camera. "My captain is a raging badass. That's how. Starfleet Command saw how good he was at his job and decided 'you know what? It's fucking stupid to leave him behind a desk' and gave us this beast straight from the yard. The paint wasn't even dry."

"Wow," was all Lisa could say.

"First thing we did? Start doing what we were usually doing: building starbases. Eventually, we had to clean up a mess at Bajor, which ended up with the boss threatening god-like beings that live in a wormhole."

"Wormhole?"

"A… corridor, if you will, that connects two different points in space, and sometimes time. Sometimes they're fairly short, but this particular one allowed people to travel 70,000 light-years in mere moments."

"And god-like beings?"

"They live outside linear time, but we know how to hurt them. The boss decided he'd had enough of their shit and told them to smarten up or die. The Bajorans didn't like it, but in the end, they didn't have a choice. I think some Bajorans deified him because he's the only one that had the balls to actually threaten to kill them. And if it weren't for Captain Sisko, he would have gone through with it."

"And who is that?" Lisa asked.

"Starfleet Officer who fit several Bajoran prophecies and became a religious figure to them: 'The Emissary', I think was the title. Helped lead the Federation to victory against a nasty group called the Dominion some 40 years ago, then got pulled into the realm of the wormhole aliens to 'learn' from them."

"Your world is… strange."

"Welcome to Starfleet. Fucked up is the word of the day!"

* * *

While the world was being introduced to Starfleet, a group of people were meeting on how to adjust their plans accordingly.

"I am not exactly pleased with this turn of events." A strange woman turned to a council of others, her black and red eyes scanning them. "They managed to destroy a town in Atlas with seemingly the flick of their wrist and they have a fleet of ships in the skies above. Tell me… how shall we deal with them?"

"Well, we can't take them on directly, that's for sure," said a green-haired woman with orange eyes and fairly dark skin. "They'd wipe us out like it was nothing."

An elderly-looking man nodded in agreement. "The captain of that ship taught at Beacon Academy for several days. I believe he even asked the students to try and kill him, though with limited success. They just couldn't hurt him: dust, blades, bullets, even direct melee attacks did nothing."

A man crouching in his chair scoffed. "I could take him out with ease. He's just a fat man with fancy technology inside his body!"

"Technology which transformed an entire town into a threat that even the Grimm couldn't fight," Another muscular man with a gruff voice informed, leaning back in his seat. "These people, these… Starfleeters… they are complete unknowns to us. Energy weapons, starships, enough military force to take down one - if not all - of the Kingdoms, and technology that is completely unreliant on Dust." He let out a tired sigh "This is something none of us could've ever predicted."

"I agree. So how are we going to deal with them?"

The leader of the group looked to a black-haired woman in a red dress. "Cinder, contact Adam Taurus. See if the White Fang will rise to combat the newcomers."

"I don't think they will unless convinced the Starfleeters are a danger to the Faunus. Seeing that there's at least five different species on that ship, there's probably some cooperation on that thing."

She glared at Cinder, who flinched before sighing. "Do what you must. But the… Ra Cailum, was it? …must not interfere with our plans for Remnant. If Ozpin gets Captain Pinkerton's aid, the Maidens will be forever lost to us."

Cinder nodded "As you wish,"

Her eyes glowed red. Salem would NOT be denied. Ozpin would lose.

* * *

 **USS Ra Cailum**

* * *

"THIS is my pride and joy. Main engineering." The massive warp core thrummed with power as it glowed, red and blue lights showing the flow of fuel into the chamber.

"What… is that?"

"That's the warp core: officially, the title's Gravimetric Field Displacement Reactor, but warp core is simpler and more serious."

Lisa looked at it. "What… powers it?"

"Dilithium is used to enhance and stabilize the reaction, but the warp core itself uses matter/anti-matter," A new voice said, as Lily Shen climbed down from the upper level. "This baby has enough juice in her to have us travel at 20,000 times Lightspeed, and _that_ is just scratching the surface."

"Lisa Lavender, Ai-li Shen-Takeo, one of my deputy engineering officers. There's a fucking SUN in that chamber, people, contained, just barely, by magnetic containment fields. And warp drive is just ONE trick under this ship's hood. Using quantum slipstream, we could travel the galaxy in a matter of weeks. The jump drive lets us pop from one place to another—" Sonja snapped her fingers. "Like that. And then there's our accidental addition. Mitod! How's the secondary crystal chamber?"

"Still working on it," Another voice said, coming from a woman with green skin and hair, with what Lisa could only describe as a floating gasbag following her. "Slowly Drifts here has the Huragok working on it now."

"Uh…"

"Mitod, Lisa Lavender, Vale News. Mitod's an Orion, a transfer from the Klingon Defense force."

"The captain dragged my ass off a Vor'cha-class attack cruiser before you blew it up. It was my engineering skills that got me landed here."

Lisa looked at the secondary chamber, which had a plasma conduit leading to a pedestal with a chamber around the top. "The wormhole drive. Specially crystallized dilithium, warp field dynamics and one misbalanced stream turned our warp drive into a drive that allows us to jump from universe to universe."

"So… this is how you came here?" Lisa asked.

"Basically," Lily explained, "We've traveled from multiple universes - I'm actually from a different universe from the rest of the crew actually."

"How many universes _has_ this ship been to?" The reporter asked. "If you don't mind me asking."

"Let's see…" Lily thought, as she counted down her fingers. "I believe… counting _their_ universe… eight."

"Nine. We paid a visit to the Mirror Universe to return an Orb to Bajor. Not fun."

Lisa blinked. "Mirror… Universe?"

"Look into a mirror, everything's reversed. Instead of the United Federation of Planets, there's a Terran Empire, ruling over the same territory. And they ain't the friendly types. I'd know. I'm FROM that universe. I escaped the Empire and made my way to Starfleet Command on the other side. After that, I helped design the Odyssey-Class. By the way… what class IS this ship, Miss Lavender?"

Lisa's mind was spinning from all the information that was coming in "I… uh… wow…"

"THIS ship…" Sonja spread her arms and spun in a circle. "Is an Odyssey-Class superdreadnought. Fifth ship of her class, elder sister to the USS Enterprise NCC-1701-F. My baby. I take PRIDE in my work." Indeed she did.

Lisa let out a long breath. "Uh… wow. I'm… overwhelmed."

"Trust me, on this ship, overwhelmed is _status quo_. We've been jumping from universe to universe for almost 3 years. Besides, the tour's not over until we get to the bridge. So, take your pictures. I'm going to call the boss."

Lisa just nodded, as she and the Cameraman quickly began snapping as many pictures and recordings as they could with Lily's guidance, as Sonja walked off.

She walked to a console, activating the comm. "Henderson to Pinkerton."

" _Supreme Asshole here. Sup_?"

"I am going INSANE with this cheery ass bullshit! PLEASE, tell me I can shove them out a fucking airlock!"

Ron hmmed. That was bad. " _Actually, after you take them to the bridge… do just that_."

"Wait, what?"

" _Give them spacesuits first; for fuck's sake, Sonja, I don't want them DEAD. Let them experience zero-G THEN beam them back down here as the final treat_."

Made sense: space was always magical, ESPECIALLY zero-gravity.

"…we won't get in trouble for this, right?"

" _We'll just pass it off showing them a space walk or something,_ " Ron said. " _The first people of Remnant to experience Space in all its glory or some shit like that._ "

"Point taken. See you when you get back. By the way, those transporter units are loaded on the shuttles. What the hell are we doing?"

" _Refugee evac. The Faunus want to leave. I'm going to be talking with Jacques Schnee about using Baird's new...what's he calling them, DBs? To replace the faunus workforce. Personally, I think I should fucking KILL HIM for allowing this to happen in the first place and allowing it to continue, but I'm trying to be_ …" Ron groaned over the link. " **DIPLOMATIC**. _This is why I wanted to build starbases after the war. It's_ simpler."

"...you want me to beam down some of those bottles you've got in your office, Captain?"

" _Yes. PLEASE_."

* * *

Ozpin wondered why Ron sighed before a bottle of some kind materialized on his desk. It had a curved neck and a conical base. "Saurian brandy. After the shit we've had today, I think we can use a drink. And this isn't the replicated shit, either."

"How did you… get it down here without speaking?"

Ron grabbed the bottle and the two glasses it came down with. "Remember my Borginess?"

Ozpin cautiously nodded.

"I still have a subspace transceiver in my spine. Had to disable it in order to help with the Borg shit in Atlas, but the nanoprobes fixed it. I actually had a talk with my chief engineer while I was waiting for you to finish your forms on whatever's in the basement. So, what is it? Because we're picking up massive power readings that actually cut **_THROUGH_** the atmospheric interference that Dust of yours is throwing out. No small feat, I might add."

Ozpin sighed, leaning back in his chair for a moment before taking a sip from his coffee mug. "Tell me, Captain…" he began, "Have you read up on any of Remnant's old fairy tales?"

"History, for the most part. I DID read up on the silver-eyed warriors and the Maidens, though. Which one?"

Ozpin blinked. "I'm surprised—"

"Ozzy, PLEASE. On my crazy train, I've learned MANY things. One, that everything is real and fictional all at once and two, that every fairy tale has basis in fact. Noah's Ark on Earth, the sagas of Kahless the Unforgettable… all of them have been twisted and half-forgotten, but they all have some basis in fact. That and Ruby's eyes are silver."

Ozpin's brow twitched at the nick name, before setting the cup aside as he stood up. "Please follow me, Mr. Pinkerton."

The captain got up, following him into the lift before screaming "ALL ABOARD! AHAHAHAHAHA!"

"I wonder how your crew hasn't killed you yet."

"You have no idea what we've gone through."

The lift went down, heading underground, Ron's ears buzzing thanks to white-noise generators. "WNGs. Nice touch. No use against subspace comms, but good enough against your comms."

Ozpin looked at Ron's ears. "You can HEAR that?"

"My hearing is INSANELY acute. And no, that's me pre and post-assimilation."

Ozpin nodded. Of course it was.

The lift stopped, allowing them to get out. "Nice vault. The Ferengi would be proud. Solid limestone reinforced with concrete and steel rebar. Wouldn't stand a chance in hell against a few photon grenades, let alone a torpedo, but it gets the job done, I guess."

"Until your people came here, those were the last of our worries," Ozpin said as the two walked towards the end of the vault - where Ron spotted a large machine with two rectangular containers in the end. One was empty, but the second was occupied with a woman inside, her face scarred. "Since you seem to be a blunt and too the point man, Captain - I'll give it to you straight. This… is Amber, the Fall Maiden, one of four women who have inherited the powers of the Maidens."

"I'm going to be honest. She looks like shit."

"A rude, but apt description, Captain. Amber was attacked recently, and barely survived the encounter. I hope I'm not imposing—"

"I just need an isolinear tag and I can beam her to the safest place in the universe at the moment. I doubt your enemies have the ability to get into space and breach the defenses of an Odyssey-Class starship."

Ozpin wasn't going to ask that, but Ron had a point: who in the hell would be dumb enough to attack the Ra Cailum? Compared to Remnant's meger military force, the Ra Cailum could probably fend off any attack launched against them for decades.

"Thank you, Captain," Ozpin said. "It was my greatest fear that something might happen to Amber during the Vytal Festival. At least now she'll be safe until we can find the people who attacked her in the first place… they stole a portion of her Maiden powers, hence her current condition."

Ron placed his commbadge on the medical capsule. "Pinkerton to Ra Cailum: lock onto my commbadge and beam it to Deck 2, section 14."

"Beaming away, sir."

Amber's pod disappeared, leaving nothing but dust. "Well, that was easy. She'll be fine on board. Unless we get a surprise visit from the Tholians or something, I don't think there's a problem."

"…Tholians?"

"Walking screeching crystals that love themselves hot planets. 500 degrees or more. They like me."

"…yet another thing about your universe I'll have to remember," Ozpin sighed.

"Trust me, if I'm right, you will have nothing to worry about beyond… a missing species. Speaking of which, I have a Schnee to resist the urge to decapitate."

* * *

Lily welcomed the sunlight on her face. The Ra Cailum's holodecks were great, but while they simulated sunlight well, nothing beat the real thing.

"You know… this is probably the first time I've ever had legit shore leave," Jaden spoke up, as he walked with Larcei and Lily as they strolled through Vale's streets, along with two baby carriages. "Usually for me Shore leave back home would just be a hidden covert ops mission or something."

"No more secrets to hide, Jaden. We're out in the open, my uncle's actually proving to be the diplomat from hell and we might be leaving a universe on good terms for the first time since I was a child."

Lily looked at her co-wife curiously. "What about my universe?"

"Lily, we had to fight ADVENT that time and my uncle put us under the clock with those torpedoes. Which he still has. Right NOW, I just want to enjoy time outside. I don't want anything going wrong."

As if that was a cue, shouting could be heard ahead of them, as they could see the outer edges of a massive mob around the Starfleet Embassy.

"…Larcei?"

She sighed. "I know…"

"We… _could_ come back later," Lily suggested, "Wait for this to settle down…"

"Hey! You!"

"And here comes the stupid idiots." The crowd collectively turned towards the five, the two babies in their cribs crying out for their parents.

"We saw you people on the news! You're from that damned ship! The one that everyone thinks it going to magically solve _all our problems_!"

"Buddy, we're just trying to-" the man reached out for one of the carriages-

*CRUNCH*

"GHAAAAAAA!" The crowd all recoiled as Jaden grabbed the man's hand, and crushed it _with his bare hands_.

"Touch them… and die."

"Sure you're not related to my uncle? That's a Ron reaction right there."

Jaden smiled viciously. "Just goes to show you how much time I've spent around him."

He punched the idiot in the face, knocking him out.

And breaking his skull into about 50 different pieces, but at least the idiot was alive. "So, who's next? Because if any of you even TRY to touch them, I'm not going to be nice about it!"

He cracked his knuckles as Larcei and Lily also moved up in front of their kids. "And neither will we," Lily growled, as she pressed a button on her wrist.

"There's three of you and-" Suddenly there was a transporter beam sound behind them, as the group looked behind them and…

" _SPARK Unit One, active._ " An automated voice announced, as a tall three-meter robot stood behind them, armed to the teeth with weapons and armor plating, glaring down at the protestors. " _Friendlies: Jaden Takeo, Larcei Yamato, Lily Shen, Catharine Takeo, Adrian Takeo, identified. Potential hostiles: twenty five unarmed combatants. Threat Level..._ " It primed its main weapons. " _Zero._ "

The crowd backed off a little, but one dumb idiot mouthed off. "You think your robot can scare us?! We're not afraid of you space people! You won't conquer the faunus! If this humanity fails, so will yours!" At this point, Jaden finally noticed the signage: all related to the White Fang.

Oh, how he wished he could just SHOOT them. "Larcei, can you call your uncle? I think he needs to relieve himself of retards."

"Right," Larcei replied, before tapping her commbadge. "Uncle Ron? We've… got a bit of a situation out here."

* * *

"You're fucking kidding me."

" _Language! There's children around._ "

Ron's eyes widened in surprise. "Whoops. Mob of idiots, all of whom don't care about Sparky?"

" _And Sparky's only got his autocannon; we didn't have time to give him a phaser-based weapon before we beamed him down. If he fires, people will get badly hurt._ "

"I'll deal with the retards. Keep my niece and nephew safe."

"Will do," Larcei replied, before the channel closed.

Ron sighed, glancing at Ozpin "Sorry, some… idiots need to be taken care of."

"Just don't kill any of them please," Ozpin requested, "Don't want to give them any _more_ ammunition to blame their troubles on Starfleet."

"Oh, they'll be fine." Ron pulled out his compression rifle. "Now I get to end a mob. MY way."

* * *

The mob had actually grown, formed from more faunus, with a counter-mob, if such a thing existed, from the Pro-Ra Cailum Faunus Group.

Which was their official name, believe it or not.

Timber was leading the group, yelling back at the idiots supporting the White Fang. "Starfleeters leave!"

"You don't belong here!"

"Get the hell off our world!"

The two babies began to cry, their mothers trying to calm them down.

Jaden's fists clenched, moments away from just saying 'fuck it', before he head another beaming sound, causing him to smirk.

' _Three, two, one..._ '

"Suprise, Mother-" Ron began to say, before he noticed the crying of the children… and his eyes twitched. "Aw _hell_ no."

And cue the Psycho shower scene music.

"You assholes threaten my family and make my niece and nephew cry?! Time to suffer, cockbites!"

He opened fire with his compression rifle from above, hitting several of the idiots, causing them to scream for their mothers as they left their fallen comrades behind. Ron landed on the ground as soon as the area was cleared, continuing to fire at the White Fang groupies.

Timber left the crowd, walking up to the Captain. "You… I thought you were different."

"Oh, COME ON. You didn't read the whole booklet, did you?"

"Huh?"

"Check them - they're not dead," Jaden informed, lightly nudging one of the fallen Faunus who groaned. "Phasers have a stun feature - Ron's a lot of things, but he'd never kill unarmed people intentionally. Give e'm a few hours, they'll be back up and about…"

"Oh…" Timber blinked. "Well… that's… actually a relief…" He then sighed. "But still… sorry about this… the White Fang idiots just came recently, we tried to get them to leave but… well… you saw how that went."

"Badly. Not to worry: I'm known for my bouts of genocide—"

"What?"

"Times of war. I kill people. LOTS of them. But when I kill, I kill soldiers. I kill people holding weapons in their hands, people that don't want anything less than the death of my crew and me. Civilians, I avoid like the plague if I can."

It made sense for that: he was a soldier and a leader, but not a cold-hearted murderer. He would only kill those that were ready to die for their cause, not angry civilians.

"Well… I'll make sure to spread the word on that," Timber informed. "We'll round up the WF supporters, let KVPD take care of them."

"Indeed. Now, I believe Miss Lavender is going to be coming down in a moment. After all, we did shove her out an airlock."

Timber looked at Ron in shock. "WHAT?!"

"Relax, it was to show her what space is like without AG fields and atmospheric containment fields. She was wearing a suit."

Showers of light signalled the news crew's arrival moments later. "Wow! And you do that…" Lisa looked at the 'battlefield'. "What happened here?!"

"Stupid happened. Mob formed. I put it down."

"And before you can worry, our energy weapons have stun settings," Larcei informed.

"Why did you… shoot them?"

"They were mobbing around my niece and her family. I took great care to make sure they were left alive. I don't kill civilians. And you can add THAT to your news report, Miss Lavender."

"Oh! I… I see," she said. "Well… as… as long as they'll be all… alright…"

"Eh, a few days and some aloe vera gel and they'll be fine. Phaser burns on the stun setting fade after a few days."

"Well, you heard it from the Captain of the Ra Cailum: even a mob of unruly people can be put down easily and without anyone getting seriously hurt. This is Lisa Lavender for VNN, signing off."

* * *

 **117Jorn: Another day for the USS _Ra Cailum_ on Remnant!**

 **Ron the True Fan: But all good things come to an end. The longest arc of the fic as of yet is winding down. And going straight to hell.**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Yep. Pinkerton and Yamato Luck is about to strike again with a vengeance.**

 **117Jorn: What fate shall befall Remnant? What will happen to the people of the four Kingdoms? Find out in the next installment of _STAR TREK ODYSSEY_!**

 **Ja Ne!**


	38. Chapter 38

**USS Ra Cailum, orbit of Remnant**

* * *

 _Captain's log, USS_ Ra Cailum _, stardate 91258.3: The_ Ra Cailum _and her fleet have spent just over a month in orbit of Remnant, though we are preparing to leave. The majority of the Faunus have requested to join us, much to my dislike: I would like to not drag people who should want nothing to do with us back to our universe. In the spirit of their Vytal Festival, we're opening a section of the ship up to tours for the civilian population after security checks._

* * *

After a whole month of preparation - in addition to the new arrivals from the stars - and the time had finally come: the Vytal Festival was upon Remnant as the massive floating stadium arrived at Beacon, as airships traveled to and from the traveling stadium.

"The halls are being refit with type-4 phaser emitters, disguised as decorative hangings. Anyone decides to pull something stupid, they get stunned and security deals with them." Sonja gestured to the base of the stadium, displayed as a hologram. "A class-4 fusion reactor at the base supports a new gravity field generator, allowing it to float without using dust. Allows you to use more for the arena."

"You've certainly outdone yourself, Miss Henderson." Ozpin commented, looking up at the massive stadium above them.

"Eh, this is nothing."

"She's right. This isn't worth mentioning. SCE personnel could do this in their sleep. This is child's play." Ozpin had much to learn about Starfleet, but their engineers were clearly MUCH better then any of theirs.

The Ra Cailum was sure sign of that. "And your security forces?"

"Unless you want us to send a few people down, it's your show. Mobius and Gold Squadrons will be flying top cover after they perform an aerial demo, but that's a formality."

"Thank you, though if you could spare one team of your people for security, it would be much appreciated," Ozpin informed. "It never hurts to be overly precautious."

"I can send down Delta-Two. They're probably bored out of their minds up on the Ra Cailum."

* * *

 **USS Ra Cailum**

* * *

Blake knew the ship as well as the ship's master, but the rest of her team, which had been visiting the ship constantly in preparation for their leaving, weren't.

So she had decided to take them on a proper tour. If they were staying, they might as well learn how to navigate without asking Cassie or the ship's computer for help.

So far they've made some progress - finding the Bridge, Main Engineering was easy enough for them to remember. However now they had stopped at another room.

"What's this?" Ruby asked, looking at the door titled "Holodeck".

"Holodeck. It creates holograms based on photons and forcefields that simulate just about anything."

Ruby's eyes lit up. "Really?!"

Blake sighed before leading them inside. "Computer, produce the bridge of the starship USS _Enterprise_." A tone was heard before the computer's VI replied. "There are seven Federation starships bearing that name." The faunus girl sighed. "Fine. _Galaxy_ -Class, registry Nova-Charlie-Charlie-One-Seven-Zero-One-Delta, cerca 2365. Exact stardate…" She racked her brain. "42761.9."

A moment passed, before the doors slid open revealing the interior of a starship - a bridge similar to the _Ra Cailum_ , but it wasn't empty as there was several individuals within, wearing similar colored uniforms the _Ra Cailum_ crew wear, but different. However none of them seemed to pay any mind to their presence.

A tall being looked down at a bald man sitting in the center chair. "Captain, the sixth planet in the system is Class M." The man on the port-side station worked on the console before reporting in on his findings. "There is a system of roads on this planet, which indicates a highly industrialised civilisation. But where there should be cities there are only great rips in the surface."

THe tall man in the back spoke up once more, looking at the console. "It is as though some great force just scooped all the machine elements off the face of the planet."

"Who are they? And why can't they see us?"

"This is the bridge crew of the _Enterprise_ -D during first official contact with...someone we've met. As for why they can't see us, the holograms are running in objective mode."

"It is identical to what happened to the outposts along the Neutral Zone."

The tactical console beeped again. "Captain, we are being probed."

The man to the bald one's right spoke up for the first time. "What is the source of the probe?"

"A ship. It is on an intercept course!"

Baldy nodded. "On screen." An image appeared on the screen, showing a massive cube in space. "Magnify."

The screen zoomed in, giving a closer look at the incoming vessel. A giant metallic cube-like vessel with no indication of engines of any form, but the structuring of the ship looked oddly familiar to Ruby, Weiss and Yang.

"What… is that?"

"Computer, change location and time: 4 minutes ahead, Deck 36, main engineering." The bridge faded away, replaced by a room with a similar warp core to the Ra Cailum before they saw a green swirl of light deposit something they all knew all too well.

"Security to main engineering! We have an intruder."

"Borg…" Ruby whispered.

"There's a saying in Starfleet that the _Enterprise_ draws all the important and weird assignments," Blake remarked. "Though the crew of the _Ra Cailum_ believe their ship draws what leaves the _Enterprise_ alone, and with good reason, considering what they've run into over this journey. But yes, the _Enterprise_ was the one to make first official contact with the Borg."

They watched as Baldy, Captain Jean-Luc Picard, tried to reason with the drone, but got nothing before the program ended.

"Hey!"

"Don't you have a tour to conduct, Miss Belladonna?"

Blake sighed. "Commander Ptolemy."

Cassie's holographic form materialized, unamused. "Takeshi and Lunamaria are on their way here, seeing as they might be the only ones to get you out of here and learn how to walk the ship."

"Right," Blake replied. "Well, I guess we can continue watching this another time."

The team left the holodeck, Ruby shivering. "Borg."

"You're the one who wanted to know what it was, Ruby. And what I'm probably going to be facing in the future."

Yang ehed before Blake continued. "I'm considering joining Starfleet. Captain Pinkerton was an Academy instructor; he could endorse my entrance."

"Wow," Ruby replied. "Well… I think we _all_ know what we're doing in that situation, right, girls?"

"Ruby, it's just my choice!"

"And we're not letting you risk your life alone. As soon as the captain gets back, we're all going to talk to him."

Unity or death. Blake was used to that, but she wasn't with the White Fang anymore. But she wasn't going to be able to change their minds.

She wouldn't get very far. "Alright, let's talk to him."

* * *

Ron had barely gotten a chance to sit down in his chair before his ready room doors opened, allowing Ozpin to enter. "Oh, COME ON, I JUST sat down!"

"We need to talk, Captain."

"About what? More security bullshit? If you don't think Atlas could handle it—"

"No, it's not 'security bullshit'. I've just learned that Team RWBY has withdrawn from Beacon. All four of them."

"I thought that Miss Belladonna wouldn't talk to her team about her choice—"

"What choice?!"

"She is a former Borg. the technology cannot be removed, ergo she either has to leave Remnant or she has to die and the Borg technology removed from her corpse. I was expecting her choice to be the latter, to be honest: she always seemed the suicidal type to me."

"She has had a troubled past, Captain," Ozpin informed. "Regardless, I do not believe she would ever take her own life. Throw herself into a battle situation where the likelihood of death is high? Yes. Just kill herself? No."

"I've seen her life, Ozpin. And with that shit in her body, I fully expected her to commit suicide."

"You're painting your own views on it, Captain. But you haven't seen Team RWBY. Where one goes, they all go."

Ron groaned. "And what do you want me to do? Force them back to Beacon? I'm not going to just say 'I don't want you'. They choose what they want to do."

Ozpin sighed. "I… very well, Captain, I'll let this slide. Just… try not to poach any more of my more promising teams, alright? Even if it is accidental."

"They make their own choices, Ozpin."

The doors opened again, Team RWBY entering seconds later. "Oh, Professor Ozpin! We… didn't know you were here."

"He just informed me that you resigned your posts as students at Beacon. I wasn't expecting THAT to happen."

"Blake's one of us, Captain," Ruby replied. "She's an integral member of Team RWBY, just like Yang, Weiss, and myself are. We stick together, no matter what."

"So did you just walk into my ready room to tell me that you collectively resigned?"

Ruby shook her head. Ron prepared for a torpedo to the face.

After all, he'd survived ONE torpedo to the face.

"Actually, no. We came to ask if we could join Starfleet."

Ron and Ozpin both stared. Ozpin's stare was more regretful, given that he truly was losing one of his best Huntsman Teams. Though, given what Ron had said and what he knew of RWBY, it was almost inevitable, given the circumstances.

Ron, on the other hand...

He slammed his head on his desk and moaned out one single word.

"Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck…"

"Captain?"

"I stopped being an instructor 13 years ago. And my classes were extreme combat. I have no right to take you on as cadets."

"You don't need to! Just give us… uh…"

Blake finished for Ruby. "Commissions. And he can't. Especially for you, Ruby: you're 15, we're barely 17. Minimum age for entering Starfleet Academy is 18 Terran years of age. There are VERY few exceptions to the rule. Though the Captain himself is one of them: he was admitted at 16."

"Oh," Ruby replied. "Well, we still would like to join Starfleet, Captain."

"Remnant isn't a Federation member world."

"You can still sponsor our academy membership, like Captain Sisko did for Nog."

"…I regret letting you look inside my head. Besides, I punched Sisko in the face."

Blake actually smiled. "Yes, you did. And told him to report back to DS9. He's still in the wormhole."

"Fine. Report to the Hiroshima. That's now your cadet trainer. Ask Takeshi and Luna to set you up."

The four nodded, Blake and Weiss smiling slightly while Ruby and Yang had massive grins. "Thank you so much, Captain," Weiss said.

Ron waved them out. "Just so you know, I was a nightmare at the Academy."

"We KNOW."

* * *

"Yeah, he was," Takeshi told the four, shivering slightly at the memories. "He was our instructor, back before he transferred out."

Luna nodded. "And even then, he was a scary taskmaster."

"Really?"

"He beat Takeshi's brains out before my stepmother stopped him."

Takeshi shivered again. "To be fair, I'd been dating Luna for a few months, and she hadn't told me about him or him about me. She'd been planning to get around to it the next day, but…"

Ruby giggled.

"It was NOT funny. He almost killed me!"

"You should have asked who Luna's family were after you started dating. It would have avoided your head getting caved in."

Takeshi slammed his head into the wall. "WHY?"

Luna decided to spare Takeshi further torment. "On that topic, Miss Rose," she said, "have you told your father about your new relationship with Miss Schnee?"

"Oh, he's happy for me. Weiss and I are actually thinking of putting in for separate quarters neighboring Blake and Yang's rooms."

"…Room. I'm not staying alone."

"There are plenty of rooms on board; most of the crew actually stay with others willingly. The Ra Cailum's second nickname is 'the love boat' for a reason."

Blake kissed Yang on the cheek, driving the point home.

Takeshi smiled. "Glad to see you four doing so well after what happened down there," he said. "Also, something for you all to consider, not exactly right away, but whenever you feel ready for that step."

"What is it?" Weiss asked.

"Well, if at some point any of you consider wanting children, you aren't limited to adoption," Takeshi informed. "Federation medical technology is capable of allowing two women to have a biological child together."

Team RWBY collectively blushed. "Really?"

"Yes. It involves—"

"No, no. I don't want to know how it works. I'm just… happy that it does."

"Alright," Takeshi replied. "Well, I wish you good luck in the training. You're going to need it."

* * *

Velvet looked at the PADD that was provided to her by Blake. "Listen to this. The Federation, while allowing each of its' member worlds and races to have their own laws, has a policy of being universal equality. In fact, the Federation President hasn't been a member of the four founding races in over 150 years."

Coco was barely interested. "Really."

"Yes! That means even a faunus could become the leader of the Federation!"

Velvet was tempted to sign up to join the Ra Cailum fleet and leave Remnant. Her limited interactions with the Ra Cailum crew could be described as 'same as talking to a human'. They took a look at her ears for one second before moving on in the conversation. In three words?

 _They didn't care_. They didn't care what _kind_ of Faunus she was, or that she was a faunus _at all_! For the first _real_ time in her life, outside her team, she was considered an equal!

But that was another problem in itself… _her team_.

Velvet wanted this so bad, to _finally_ be treated as equals among others - and on top of that, to start a life living _in space_ , a place no one from Remnant has been before! But on the flip side… there was her team. Having been with them for so long, training with them, fighting with them… they were like family to her.

She wasn't sure she could convince them to leave with her…

"You're really interested in this," Yatsuhashi commented.

"Well…" Velvet gulped "I'm… actually thinking of leaving with them."

Coco's sunglasses dropped from her face. "What."

"Coco, I know you don't care that I'm a faunus, but… Everyone else DOES!" she exclaimed. "CRDL always finds some reason to harass me and everyone outside Beacon… I was saved from a group of abusers by Captain Pinkerton. He gave one look at me and passed only one judgement: that me being a Faunus didn't MATTER! A complete stranger, not caring about that! Can you understand that feeling?"

Before Coco or the rest of the team could even speak, Velvet still wasn't done. "I've visited their Embassy several times, and it's the one place I feel safe!" She continued, "The people look at me, and they just smile! They don't see me as any different from anyone else! Hell, some of them have _fan clubs_ for Faunus!"

Yatsuhashi blinked "Fan… clubs?"

"Yeah, apparently people with animal-like features like Faunus are adored by humans from the Federation's capital of Earth," She explained, "Some place called Akihabara Japan… I think Blake has a small _cult_ that follows her around… "

Coco actually laughed. "You're shittin' me!"

"I'm not. Commander Ptolemy, the ship's AI, let me look into the ship's database. Their assistant chief engineer isn't even a member of the Federation, too! That just shows you how ACCEPTING they are! They don't care _what_ you are. They care more about _who_ you are! Your personality, your likes, dislikes! I spent a whole day on that ship and I felt like I was… coming home."

Velvet was notoriously insecure. For her to be so RELAXED on a ship surrounded by strangers...

It was unheard of.

"Wow… you're really serious," Coco remarked.

"How can't I be? I'm normal in their eyes." She said, before sighing "But… at the same time..."

The CVFY leader didn't need to be a genius to know what's going through the Faunus's head. "Its us, isn't it?" She asked, causing Velvet to perk up. "It's written all over you, Velvet… you don't want to leave us behind, right?"

"...I just..." she shook her head "I don't want to… just _leave_ you guys, right? I mean… I know we haven't been a team for that long, but… you three… you're the best friends I've ever had… you're like family to me…"

The other three members of the team all looked at Velvet in surprise, however Coco sighed.

"Well then… guess we should pack our things then, huh?"

Velvet blinked "Huh?"

Coco smirked slightly, as the others nodded. "Well, a team sticks together, doesn't it?" she asked. "And this _is_ a once in a lifetime opportunity… going on a spaceship, going to different worlds… who knows what kind of new outfits are out there, eh?"

"B-But Remnant-"

"Is _fine_ ," Coco said, standing up. "Starfleet's really helped clean up the Grimm problem and dishing out punishment to the Bandits across the lands. If anything we'll have more to do up there than we would down here." Coco picked up her sunglasses. "We'll talk to Captain Pinkerton. His class is on, isn't it?"

Velvet nodded. The captain wasn't the most popular man, but the Federation was and with Captain Pinkerton being their ticket to getting off Remnant, he was the go-to man of the day. The Faunus were fleeing Remnant by the thousands thanks to the Ra Cailum.

The four got up and headed for the arena, where Ron's class was in session.

Instead of the captain, though, they found a girl with spiral-like twintails fighting Team CRDL.

And shooting them in the balls with muckets. Cardin was on the ground, bleeding and moaning while the rest of his team were screaming for their mothers. When they did, she put another round into them.

"Wow…" Coco said, surprised. "She's… really laying a smackdown on them… who **_is_** that?"

"I… I think that's the Captain's adopted daughter, Mami," Velvet replied. "I've seen her once or twice at the embassy."

She whipped Cardin into a wall. "Next time, think before you try to accost me. I'm not that easy." She fired a blunderbuss into Cardin's chest, the armor taking most of the impact, but he had at least one broken rib.

She jumped out of the ring, using a generated ribbon to boost her way out. "Idiots. They thought I was just some blonde bimbo." She looked at Team CFVY. "Ah, you must be Coco Adel. Mami Tomoe. I'm sorry, but my father's busy setting up beam out points all over Remnant."

"For all the Faunus that are wanting to leave?" Velvet asked.

"For anyone that wants to leave. The Faunus are just the most obvious. We've got people that want to leave all over the planet. The Schnee Dust Company's getting pissed off at my father. I believe my father said that if the SDC decided to try and stop their workers from seeking out a new life for themselves, he'd take measures."

"Wow," Velvet replied. "That's… that's really big… bigger than I thought…"

"You do know his measures will involve massive amounts of death if they push this?" Velvet nodded. While it was a little too White Fang-esque for their tastes… this wasn't coming from a Faunus extremist group.

This came from a human that was NOT tolerating this any further.

"I take it you wanted to speak to my father?"

"Yes," Velvet said with a nod. "I…" she glanced at Coco, Fox, and Yatsuhashi, who all nodded in turn. " ** _We_** would like to go with you when you leave."

"Professor Ozpin's going to be mad. Luckily, I'm not the one he has to deal with." Mami handed them a pin. A chevron with 'wings'.

It was the emblem of Starfleet, of the USS Enterprise.

An emblem of hope that the Faunus were embracing as tightly as they could.

"Is there a beacon in there for your transporters or something?" Coco asked as Velvet took the pin.

"It's a commbadge. Press it and you'll be beamed up to either the Ra Cailum, the Hiroshima or the Torrens. The latter two are _Saber_ -Class light frigates being used as Academy trainers, seeing as Team RWBY's applied for Starfleet training."

"Wait, really?" Coco asked. "Wow."

Velvet pressed the commbadge, and within seconds the four disappeared from Remnant in swirling columns of light.

They reappeared in a room on a pad akin to one of the platforms they saw placed in Vale. "Welcome to the _Hiroshima_. I'm Lieutenant Maria Schreck, commanding officer."

CFVY stepped off the pad, looking around the room. "Uh… what just happened?"

"Never seen transporters before?" Maria asked. "Well, in short, the transporter scans your biological pattern, turns you into energy, moves that energy to your destination, and then uses that pattern to rebuild you."

"So, are we… us, or…"

"Yes, you're still you. You're not clones, you've still got your souls, blah, blah, blah. We've heard it all and by this point, it's getting fucking ANNOYING."

They'd heard that kind of speech pattern before.

From Ron. "Are you related to Captain Pinkerton?"

"First cousin, father's side of the family. Nepotism isn't tolerated on the Ra Cailum: I EARNED my way on this ship."

"Gotcha," Coco replied. "Reason we asked is… well, you certainly _sound_ like him in terms of the way you speak."

"My aunt raised me. After my parents died, Aunt Ayame took me in and raised me alongside Lunamaria and Riza."

Coco nodded. "Alright," she said. "Makes sense. So, where is the guy, anyway?"

"Atlas, dealing with Jacques Schnee. And resisting the urge to pull a bullet in his head. The only planet that has legal slavery in the Federation is Ardana and we've been pushing them to make reforms since Kirk's visit. At least now they're making it more a working class. We do NOT like slavery."

"You have a planet that has legal slavery?"

Maria shrugged. "Again, they've been working on it. Kirk made a few of them go into their mines and they… didn't like it."

Velvet nodded. "Alright," she said. "Well, do you have a place where we can wait for him? We'd like to talk to him about coming with you guys when you leave."

"Sure, we've already set aside some quarters on deck C," Maria informed. "Just tap on a console and the computer will guide you there."

"Uh, is Team RWBY on board?"

"Actually, they're on board the Ra Cailum."

A disembodied voice then came over the comm. " _Pinkerton to Hiroshima Actual._ "

"I'm here, cousin, go ahead."

" _Ozpin's chewing my ass again: he's telling me Team CFVY just beamed up, but I checked with Cassie: they're not on the Ra Cailum and the Torrens isn't ready yet. Are they up there?_ "

Maria sighed. "Yes, they are."

"Goddamn it, WHY the hell are they up there?! Nevermind, I KNOW why. Send them to the Ra Cailum, deck 12 section 24."

"Got it, boss." Maria nodded. "Okay people, looks like waiting's not a problem - I'll beam you right over there now."

"Ah, right. Thanks." Velvet nodded, as the four awaited transport.

"Energizing..."

* * *

"While Starfleet's primary roles are defense and exploration, oftentimes officers are called upon to be diplomats." A Vulcan gestured to the board in front of them, Team RWBY now wearing the uniforms of Starfleet cadets, Weiss taking down notes.

"One of the greatest diplomats Starfleet has ever had was Jean-Luc Picard, who negotiated settlements between the Gatherers of Acamar III and their planetary government being one of his most notable triumphs. There were few races Picard could not handle in the diplomatic arena."

The other members of RWBY were also paying attention… or at least trying too. Blake wasn't a problem, as she continued to focus on what the teacher said. Yang was trying to listen too, but kept dozing off to sleep before Blake woke her up. And Ruby… well…

Weiss poked the slightly snoring Ruby in the head, jolting her awake.

"Cookies!" She smacked Ruby upside the head. "Sorry, Weiss."

"Cadet Rose, pay attention. These are important for your passing grades."

"But I'm not a diplomat! I don't even know how to talk to people!"

The Vulcan wasn't impressed. But he did stand straighter once a group of people entered the room, led by Takeshi and his wife.

"Commander Yamato, welcome back to Starfleet Academy."

"Thanks," Takeshi replied. "Never thought I would come back, though… too many scary memories."

"Yes, your brawl with Captain Pinkerton is well-documented."

"Commander, PLEASE tell me you didn't have to go through with all this!"

"Sadly, we did. At least your extreme combat courses won't be as bad. You've already had Ron teaching you."

Yang smirked before remembering how he was kicking their asses before the Borg reared their ugly mugs.

However before anything more could be said, suddenly four more figures were beamed into the room - who Ruby and her team immediately recognized. "Velvet?"

"Ruby! I'm glad to see you! …Though you look weird in that uniform."

Ruby chuckled nervously. "It's, uh… Starfleet standard issue!"

"I never had to wear that abomination of a uniform, thankfully." The Vulcan stood to attention as Ron himself came in, looking VERY annoyed.

"You didn't have to wear this uniform?"

"I wore the last version. Which was a fuck of a lot more utility-minded. Now, where's the idiots responsible for me having to deal with Ozpin's bitching and moaning for things outside my control AGAIN for over an hour?"

"Umm… here…" Velvet said, raising her hand timidly.

"GodFUCKINGDAMN it! The ones who got me into the Beacon teaching mess to begin with, not to mention the ones I blame for the Borg incident! If you were just a LITTLE more fucking assertive, I wouldn't've needed to get those assholes off your back to begin with! Fuck my life!"

Velvet seemed to recoil a bit at this. "Uh…"

"There is NO fucking excuse! NONE! Just speak your piece and be done with it before I shove my head through a wall! Or fifty!"

Velvet took a breath, gathering up her courage. "I… I want to go with you when you leave," she said. "I feel more at home up here than I did on Remnant. I… I talked with my team, and they'd like to come, too."

Ron walked over to a wall, then slammed his fist into it, breaking into the reinforced duranium rebar.

"Then you are going to talk to Ozpin. You are going to tell him your reasons for joining the fleet and YOU will take the responsibility off my head. He thinks I'm manipulating his students into leaving when I'm not doing a fucking thing. Consider that your price of admission, Miss Scarlatina, as you have given me NOTHING but headaches since we got here. You owe me THAT much." He left the holodeck, pissed off.

"He's not wrong about the headaches. Those take months to fade with his positronic brain."

"He's blaming ME for being me?"

"Think about it. If you kicked their asses, Ron would never have had to intervene. Then the likeliness of us going to Beacon would be down to somewhere close to zero. So… yeah, you are kinda to blame for the entire debacle."

Velvet's eyes looked toward the ground. "What pisses him off the most is your inability to fight back. We're nice people, sure, but we are going to run into people that want us dead. What are you going to do next time someone's trying to kill you? Cry or break their necks?"

"What makes me any different from the White Fang then?" She muttered, causing Takeshi to blink. "I've always been in a no-win scenario, if I don't fight back, I get bullied…. But if I do, and gods forbid _kill_ them… what makes me different from the White Fang? People who want respect through _fear_?"

Takeshi shook his head. "That's not what we're saying. You think any of us have clean hands? Ron's might be the most bloodstained and he'll admit it, but we've ALL killed. The only difference is this: he gave them a chance to back off. 'Go away; I don't want to hurt you'; that's how he operates. That's how we ALL operate. Self-defense is perfectly fine. We don't run around killing people; that's the Terran Empire." Velvet's expression was confused before Takeshi answered. "Trust me, you don't want to know. Remember the first time we met. He gave them a _choice_."

Velvet actually thought about it. Takeshi was right: Ron DID give them a chance to walk away. After they threw it back in his face, he beat the shit out of them.

He didn't run the ship by Fear… the way Takeshi put it, he ran the ship out of respect.

"Even if I do defend myself… they'll just paint me as another member of White Fang..."

"You're never going to get everyone you meet to like or agree with you," Takeshi reasoned. "But people like CRDL doesn't matter… who _should_ matter are the people you love and care about, and the people you risk your life to protect - because they will always know the real you… no matter what anyone else says."

Takeshi had a point. "Just… don't expect me to 'crack heads' all that often."

"Unless we run into Klingons. Then it's expected. It's a cultural thing with them; you'll understand when we get back home."

Velvet looked around the room, out to the simulated Golden Gate Bridge. "Commander… I _am_ home."

* * *

Cinder paced the room while Emerald read from that godforsaken PADD. "Huh. For a government only 300 years old, the Federation seems to be a lot more stable than any of the kingdoms. 'In 2265, the most historic and famous mission in Starfleet history began when Jamus Tiberius Kirk took the USS Enterprise, NCC-1701', which was the first Federation starship to bear the name, apparently, 'to the galactic rim.'"

"I don't _care_ about their history, Emerald!" Cinder snapped, as the green-haired girl flinched slightly. "Tell us what we found _that can help us BEAT THEM._ "

"Because I've been looking into their history, ma'am." She meekly tapped the PADD in a few places before presenting it to Cinder, who took it.

"They always answer distress calls, investigate disappearances. If we can lure them into a trap using that, we can capture their people, get access to the Ra Cailum. It was how Khan Noonien Singh managed to take over the USS Reliant. And once he got his hands on a Miranda-Class starship, he blitzkrieged the Enterprise, ruining the ship to the point where it was slated to be scrapped after she came back to Earth!"

Cinder closed her eyes. The plan wasn't perfect obviously, but it was so far the only plan they have the counter them. Use what makes them so beloved against them. "Pass the plan to Adam," she informed. "We'll make the arrangements from there."

"You won't be disappointed. The captain will send down a simple away team and we can capture them and their weaponry. Maybe even a communicator that we can use to beam up to the ship."

Cinder had to admit, it sounded good.

But all plans failed to survive first contact with the enemy. And when the enemy was Captain Ronald Pinkerton…

Cinder's hands flamed up. He would be the first to die by her hand.

* * *

 **117Jorn: Well, will it work for Cinder like it did for-**

 **Ron the True Fan: KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNN! (Echoes) KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNN!**

 **Blake: …you know, you could WARN us when you do that. (Rubs sensitive ears)**

 **Ruby: Speaking of Khan, don't we have something to do?**

 **Ron the True Fan: Indeed! Yang! Fire it up!**

 **Weiss: …You didn't just say that.**

 **Yang: Ok, three, two… ONE! (Punches wall)**

* * *

Omake: Khan? ...KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNN! (Echoes) KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNN!

Blake adjusted her new uniform. Navy blue with white stripes. Well, it was spartan, but it worked.

She turned away from the mirror, walking back into the common room that separated their respective quarters on Deck 6. Ruby was jumping in place.

"MOVIE NIGHT!" She called out, jumping up and down. "I'm so excited! This'll be awesome! We get to watch movies _from another universe_!"

"What's so important about this movie?"

Weiss pulled up an image of the movie cover. It read _Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan_. "Apparently, the Captain decided to steal every movie he could from their second universal visit. Their universe's greatest adventures are recorded in cinematic glory."

Blake knew the movie. Ron liked it. Mostly because of one scene.

Kirk's scream. She had to admit, hammy as it was… she liked it, too.

"What are we waiting for?" Yang said, sitting down as she grabbed a sack of popcorn. "Hit it!"

 **(Over an hour later)**

"Khan you Bloodsucker!" Admiral Kirk snapped into the communicator. "You're gonna have to do your own dirty work now, do you hear me? DO YOU?!"

"Kirk…" Khan muttered, with a surprised expression. "Kirk… you're still alive, my old friend…"

Ruby devoured a bowl of strawberries while Blake sipped a glass of baked milk. Weiss took notes for the ENTIRE movie while Yang…

"That's just gross. They came out his ear!"

"They also went IN through his ear! Chekov was brainwashed!"

"Still, 'old friend'. You've managed to kill just about everyone else, but like a poor marksman," the scene changed to the Reliant's bridge, Khan gesturing to one of his people. " _You keep_ **missing the target**!"

Khan leaned back in his chair. "Perhaps I no longer need to try, Admiral."

The scene shifted back to the Regula, where the Genesis torpedo and control unit were beamed out. "Why beam them out?"

"Khan's a megalomaniac with an ego, Ruby. I mean, look at what he did to the Enterprise. THAT sucked!"

"Khan! Khan, you have Genesis, but you don't have me!"

It shifted back to the Reliant's bridge. "You were going to kill me, Khan. You're going to have to come down here! You're going to have to come down here!"

Khan didn't bother to "I've done far worse than kill you, …I've hurt you. And I wish to go on …hurting you. I shall leave you as you left me. As you left her. Marooned for all eternity in the center of a dead planet, …buried alive."

The scene shifted back to Regula, all focus on Kirk's face. "Buried alive!"

Kirk began shaking in rage. "KHAAAAAAAAAAAN!"

A view of Regula's surface appeared before...

"KHAAAAAAAAAAAN!" Team RWBY recoiled at the echo.

"Wait, Blake… isn't the leader of the White Fang named Selina Khan?"

Blake blinked… before she paled slightly. "Oh shit…" she muttered. "If Ron finds out about that..."

Yang smirked before taking in a deep breath. Blake covered her human ears before folding her faunus ones down to her scalp.

"KHAAAAAAAAAAAN!"

Yang patted Blake's shoulder before they heard an echo.

"KHAAAAAAAAAAAN!"

That was their new superior officer's voice. "Uh-oh."

"He KNOWS."

" _Pinkerton to Team RWBY: are you watching_ The Wrath of Khan _?_ "

Blake sighed. "Yes Captain, we are…" She muttered. "I am assuming you heard the news?"

"Yes. And I heard Yang's yell, so I couldn't resist. Enjoy the Battle of the Mutara Nebula. Pinkerton out."

"Wait… space battle?!" Ruby rushed back to her seat, jumping in place.

"The excitement never ends with Team RWBY, huntresses or Starfleet officers, huh?"


	39. Chapter 39

**Vale, Remnant**

* * *

Jacques Schnee sighed before looking back across his desk. "Captain, your offer is… generous, but what's the difference between my current Faunus workforce and your robot idea?"

Ron, sighing, pinched the bridge of his nose. "It makes you look better for Remnant and keeps ME from fucking killing you. Does THAT sound acceptable to you?"

The eldest Schnee looked the captain in the eye. "Captain—"

"When I heard of your company, I hoped and PRAYED I was hearing wrong about your reputation. Then I had the _Ra Cailum_ make visual sensor sweeps of your work camps. Consider yourself lucky that Starfleet officers are governed by a code of laws that keep them from killing people without cause." Ron stood up. "Your unwillingness to even THINK of another option is _giving_ me cause. The Faunus are _sentient_ , Mr. Schnee. The Federation's highest ideals are that all sentient life is allowed to be given choice. You are committing **_crimes against sentience_**. Give me ONE good reason not to shoot you, raid the camps and bring them onto the colony ships while completely RUINING you in the process!"

Jacques was forced to facepalm. "I have to sell this idea to the board of directors, Captain. They'll want costs, money figures. Something your Federation doesn't have."

Ron handed over a PADD, which he took. "I have five Ferengi on my ship, Mr. President. They're a race of greedy profit-mongers, having only MARGINALLY improved in the last 40 years, but they know figures. A force of 50 DeeBees can build another 50, then 100 and so on and so forth until they can mine the crap out of your dust, for pennies. So don't talk to me about profit margins!"

"You stole my daughter!"

"She volunteered to join Starfleet! I had no control of her choices!"

The door tapped before both men yelled "WHAT?!" at the door.

Whitney Schnee peeked inside, scared out of his mind. "Er, Captain Pinkerton? You… have a call on our line."

Ron glared at Jacques, as if to say 'this isn't over', before he turned and said, "I'll take it in here."

He picked up the antique phone on the desk. "Pinkerton."

" _Ron, you're not going to believe this,_ " Takeshi said over the line. " _There's a massive mob outside the embassy._ "

"Oh, fuckery. Please tell me they aren't with the White Fang."

" _Doesn't look like it,_ " Takeshi replied. " _In fact, almost seems like they're… chanting your name? Yeah, that's definitely what I'm hearing over here. Congratulations, boss - looks like you might officially have a cult now._ " That last bit was said with a bit of a teasing tone.

Ron dropped the phone, along with his jaw.

Right before drawling out the word "Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck…"

"Captain, language!"

"You try reacting to gaining a cult of personality. That you DON'T WANT." He picked up the phone again. "Takeshi, get whoever the hell is leading these people and tell them that I want to talk to them! And why the hell aren't you using your communicator?"

" _Figured you'd look more silly screaming without talking back._ "

"WHY haven't I sacked you yet?"

" _Because you know how good I am in a fight, and don't care about personality quirks as long as the job gets done?_ "

"I'm starting to begin caring. Just get it done." He hung up the phone, then looked at Jacques. "Now, about that DB deal."

"Captain—"

"No. I'm tired of business excuses and bullshit from you. You have two choices: agree to a deal that makes the SDC look like they care about their public image and the safety of their workers… or I tear your fucking empire apart. You might have people that give a damn about your company, but they are **_infinitely_** outnumbered by people that hate you. The Prime Directive isn't protecting your ass anymore, President Schnee. Now, which of the two options do you prefer?!"

Jacques sighed. "I'll… agree to the deal…" he said, finally.

"Good. Baird's DeeBees will be beamed down in a few hours."

"This will cost me, Captain."

"Stop thinking in the now. Think of the future. 'Robots free Faunus from horrid workcamps; Schnee dust Company remaking its' image'. The robots don't give a fuck about the conditions. Keep people in the loop and you'll earn more profit then you'll lose in the short term."

"Very well, Captain. Well, I do believe you have things to do."

"Yes. I do."

Ron turned around and left the room. Jacques sat down and slammed his head on the desk. Ron hated his company: it was a nasty reminder of Earth's past, a past they would be more than glad to leave buried and forgotten and he made no doubts about it known.

But he hated Ron more. He took his daughter away from her, making her join that organization of his. He really blamed that faunus girl and her teammates. If it weren't for the fact that Ron made it clear, if unsaid, that he caused any emotional harm to Weiss that he would suffer physical harm, he would disown her.

But he was between the proverbial rock and a hard place… only rocks and hard places surrounded him on all sides.

"Damn it."

* * *

Weiss kept her eyes glued to the monitor.

Admiral Kirk, Commander chekov and Captain Scott were at a computer station on the bridge of the ruined _Enterprise_. Kirk was known for getting his ship and crew out of bad situations. What was he going to do?

"Computer." The computer beeped in response. "This is Admiral James T. Kirk requesting security access. Computer. Destruct Sequence One, code one, one-A."

"No way…" Ruby breathed. "He… isn't there some other way…?"

Blake shook her head. "Ruby, Khan tore the _Enterprise_ apart, remember? Starfleet was going to SCRAP her." Ruby didn't want to accept it. The _Enterprise_ was beautiful! There had to be another way!

But the computer simply answered that it was ready. Kirk's eyes betrayed his pain, at losing both his son and his ship. "Code zero, zero, zero, …destruct zero." The monitor showed an overhead image of the _Enterprise_ superimposed with a countdown. "Destruct Sequence is activated."

Weiss felt like she was going to be sick as she continued watching. This was the flagship of Starfleet, the pride of the Federation, the _Ra Cailum's_ cousin!

But Kirk and his friends made their way to the transporter pad, beaming down to the planet just as the Klingons beamed onto the ship.

"That's just wrong." The Klingons moved through the ship, after a moment reaching the bridge. The leader of the party spoke into a communicator. "My Lord. The ship appears to be deserted."

Kruge appeared on the monitor, sitting in his chair on the _B'rel_ BoP. "How can that be? They're hiding!"

"Yes sir. But the bridge appears to be run by computer. It is the only thing speaking."

"Speaking?" He straightened slightly. "Let me hear."

"Nine," the computer voice counted. "…eight, seven, six, five…"

Kruge's eyes widened before jumping out of his chair. "Get out! Get out of there! Get out!"

"…one…" the computer finished, before the explosions began.

Ruby gasped as the Klingons were thrown around the bridge before the view changed to the outside of the Enterprise, the bridge exploding. The bird of prey then flew over the Enterprise as fireballs emerged from the top of the saucer section.

The Enterprise dipped down, showing what happened to the saucer section: the hull plating was beginning to vaporize. That beautiful registry and name that they had all memorized, USS _Enterprise_ NCC-1701, was being eaten by fire.

The front half of the saucer then exploded, and the ship fell into the Genesis Planet's atmosphere, burning up as it went.

"…I think I'm going to be sick."

"You and every other officer in the fleet." Blake had a hard time keeping in tears. She knew that ship better than any of them thanks to Ron. While the others had only a few hours to view the refit _Enterprise_ , she'd spent years looking through every corridor, every room. The _Enterprise_ had a soul.

Blake was of the opinion that if the _Enterprise_ wanted to stop the auto-destruct, she would have.

But… she felt she kind of agreed with the ship's choice - it would be better to go out in a blaze of glory than a simple dismantlement - or, in her case, if she were to die, it would be better to do it in battle, actively defending those she cared about, than to take the easy way out and suicide.

"Uh… can we… skip the rest?"

"Sorry, Ruby. This isn't just entertainment, this is part of our history courses."

That was true: the _Enterprise_ and its' journeys were required reading. They were kinda cheating by watching the movies. "Uh… what about the next _Enterprise_? I think we heard Commander Yamato mention the _Enterprise_ -F."

"That should happen near the end of the next movie," Blake informed. She was cheating even more than the others, given that she had Ron's memories of watching the movies. "I won't spoil any more than that."

" _Yamato to Team RWBY._ "

Blake tapped her commbadge. "Belladonna here, Commander."

" _The captain's going to need some help on the ground. Mind giving him a hand? The first Remnant Starfleet officers would come in handy._ "

Weiss voiced one problem. "Uh… we're cadets."

" _We'll give you the standard uniform,_ " Takeshi informed. " _The crowds down below don't need to know you're still in training._ "

They hadn't even chosen a DEPARTMENT yet! Still, those uniforms did look nice. "Quartermaster's office?"

" _Deck 5, section 12, room 457-Alpha. I'll see you on the ground, ladies._ "

Ruby squeed. "Our first actual assignment!" she cheered.

"We might actually get field commissions if we do this right."

The rest of RWBY paused at Blake's words. "What?"

"Ron-sorry, Captain Pinkerton-promotes out of ability. If we do our jobs beyond the call of duty, he'll skip our formal training, assign us to schoolwork duty and promote each of us to Ensign."

The first Starfleet officers Remnant would ever have. And not the last, if RWBY had any say in it!

"All right!" Ruby cheered. "Let's go, girls!"

They left the room, heading for the turbolift. "I wonder if the captain'll let us customize our uniforms."

"Within reason. He doesn't care too much about regulations involving the uniforms so long as they look Starfleet. Meaning, yes, Ruby, you can keep your cloak."

"YAY!"

"Blake, with all that knowledge in your head, you could run this ship."

"Probably," Blake admitted. "But I don't want to command a starship. I could take over, but I don't want to command full-time. And I'm not leaving Team RWBY."

Ruby suddenly found herself given another title: Remnant's first starship captain.

Her squee of excitement was heard in the vacuum of space.

* * *

There was a mob in front of the Starfleet Embassy in Vale. They were all chanting Ron's name.

"There must be thousands of them!" Larcei exclaimed.

" _Hundreds_ of thousands," Jaden corrected.

"One million, seven hundred seventy-one thousand, five hundred and sixty-one," Lily said with a grin.

Larcei groaned. "You couldn't let that joke pass, could you…?" she said.

Jaden didn't get it. "Trust me, K-7 HATES that joke."

Ron was hiding behind a wall, poking his head out. "Are they gone?"

"You have more sensitive ears then we do, Ron."

"I KNOW, I'm just hoping I'm hearing wrong!"

Takeshi shook his head, too amused for his own good. "Nope. They're out there… waiting… watching… for YOU!"

"Takeshi, I'm going to hurt you for this."

Takeshi grinned. " ** _SO_** worth it," he said.

Four showers of light appeared on the balcony, depositing Team RWBY, wearing the old 2370s-era uniforms that were the Ra Cailum's standard. "Hello again!"

Takeshi looked them over. Under the grey and black overcoats, Ruby was wearing command/tactical red, as was Yang, while Weiss and Blake wore Operations/Engineering Gold. "Nice choices," he said. "You finally pick your career paths?"

"You know that we're not really going to be overspecialized, Commander. On his ship, everyone can do everything. But yes, we have. Until we get promoted to captain and have to swap out for the command division red."

Science, security, engineering, operations: no matter your branch, the second you get command of a starship, you swap out your gold and blue for red.

"Good to hear," Takeshi replied. "Now… I don't think we can wait any longer, Ron, you have to go out there and meet the adoring public!"

Ron's response was an extended forearm and middle finger.

"He hates talking to large crowds."

"He was an academy instructor."

"That was BEFORE he got turned into a drone, Commander: use your head. The one with your _brain_ in it, not the one in your _pants_."

Takeshi's jaw dropped at Blake's VERY Ron-esque barb.

Luna nodded in approval. "Welcome to the family."

"Thank you, Lunamaria, but I still have to sort out all of Ron's memories. We can defuse the crowd, get them less excited. All their crying out…" She winced. "I should smack you, Commander."

Now Takeshi winced. "Oh, right - very Borg-esque… sorry about that."

Again, he got the Ron Patented Middle Finger Arm Response. "Could you ladies… defuse the crowd? Explain the.. emotional situation?"

"Of course! Let's go, Team RWBY!"

Weiss shook her head wistfully at Ruby's excitement. Still, they had a bit of a job to do - best to get to it.

* * *

"Hey, Neo."

A young woman with pink and brown hair looked up silently at her partner in crime - then again, she was pretty much silent all the time, and only 'spoke' in gestures, her illusion ability, and occasional signs/notes.

"Business is gonna go down the gutter with that _Ra Cailum_ crew around. Crime's just not worth it with them here. Haven't been able to get any dust for Cindy and her animals since they popped in."

Roman Torchwick was a raging asshole. Now, he wasn't REALLY racist-if only used animal comments when they acted like fucking tools and, well, ANIMALS-but he was a general asshole to everyone but Neo.

Red was nice to play with, though.

But with that ship in orbit, all those fighters and their Raptors making radar sweeps? Yeah, it just wasn't worth it anymore.

Neo nodded.

"Still… there's a bit of opportunity there, too," Roman remarked thoughtfully.

Neo quirked an eyebrow and cocked her head to the side inquisitively.

"Think about it," Roman said. "A whole universe - several, really - out there, with _no Grimm to worry about_."

She could see his point. His normal options wouldn't work - Dust was useless to them: didn't work outside the atmosphere and they had lasers! But he could put his skills to work, making his own little network from scratch…

It was exciting. They just needed to get onto one of those ships. The colony ships would be nice, but getting onto the _Ra Cailum_ herself…

Well. THAT was a thrill.

Neo grinned. She made a small image of a question mark next to a light bulb, as if to ask 'Do you have an idea in mind?'

"We'll have to forge documents - not a problem - and you'll have to do something with your hair. Maybe me, too. Might have to hide as my kid again. Not that you mind that."

She nodded, grinning, before glomping him. She made a quick illusion changing both their hairs to a decent blonde, and made a mirror to show him what he looked like.

"Huh. That'll do. Well, we got work to do, papers to forge, all that shit, huh?" Neo just smirked happily.

* * *

The United Federation of Planets.

It wasn't just a government to the people of Remnant. It was an _ideal_!

It spoke of a universe of equality, of peace, where you weren't judged for what species you were, where you could be anyone, _do_ anything.

Viola Marron, a rare crocodile faunus, was one of these people. She ran away from the SDC's workcamps when she was a child, but wanted nothing to do with the White Fang.

Fast forward 12 years and her dream come true arrives… The USS _Ra Cailum_. A ship that was built by the hands of no fewer than _ten_ alien races and crewed by all of them!

Her captain was another ideal. His personality was that of an asshole, yes, but this asshole didn't care what you were, what you looked like. He cared only for your mind.

And if someone wanted to be an idiot, he'd make them stop being an idiot, usually through the use of force. And if someone tried to kill him, well, all bets were off.

That was why they were drawn to him. He was flawed. He was imperfect. But he ACCEPTED imperfection. Four figures then entered their view. Red, white, black and yellow.

Team RWBY. Wearing Starfleet uniforms. "Hello, everyone. Before the captain will speak to you—" THey cheered, yelling his name. She joined in, happy to meet their new idol.

"PLEASE STOP!" the crowd went silent at Ruby's yell. "The captain isn't… comfortable with loud crowds. I presume all of you know he was once a member of the Borg collective?"

There were a series of nods.

"Well, the collective sounds a bit like a large crowd," Blake informed. "Maybe not all that loud, but constant, and it's all you hear, and you can barely hear anything else."

She gasped. She was making him uncomfortable. They were making him uncomfortable.

They shut the hell up before he entered view, nervously looking over the crowd. "Good… morning, everyone. As I'm sure you're aware… I'm Captain Ronald Pinkerton. I'm not good with crowds. I'm not good at comforting people. I just speak the truth. Usually it's painful. But that's the truth: cold, painful, blunt."

There was the imperfection. "I'm actually quite terrified of having a crowd cheering my name. But you people seem to like me. A little too much. I'm no saint. Just a man. A man who can survive having an antimatter torpedo blow up in your face, but a man. I just hope you all can realize this."

* * *

 **Mountain Glenn**

* * *

Adam Taurus was beginning to pace like the bull he was. The White Fang was falling apart: the idea of having a government like the UFP was too good to ignore.

What had happened at the embassy had somehow been televised, and now he was hearing all of his forces talking about it.

"We're getting fucked, Taurus."

The faunus looked at his benefactor, Cinder Fall. "You think I hadn't noticed? We've begun suffering mass desertions! Entire cells are leaving, giving themselves up to Starfleet security forces! Like they don't care about our fight!"

Cinder groaned. "We have too much trouble trying to cope with the losses to start with your faunus pride bullshit, Adam!" Emerald's plan was a good attempt; they'd even tried it.

Problem was, the team that was sent to check in was Delta Squad.

The people that had CHAINSAWS attached to their guns.

CHAINSAWS.

 ** _ATTACHED TO GUNS!_**

Obviously, things had turned pear-shaped in QUITE the hurry.

So, while Emerald had a great idea in theory, she didn't take Pinkerton into account. On the other hand, predicting him was nigh-impossible.

Only that his response would be swift and probably painful.

"Weaklings fighting against a god. Fighting the Other is pointless when you lack the tools."

Both turned at the new voice as what could only be described as a 'swirling hole in reality' seemed to open a short distance away. From it emerged a single being, black and red, missing an arm and a few decorations, and with six glowing eyes.

Cinder backed off. Even as a maiden, she was powerless against this being. "What… are you?"

"I am T'ket, warrior of the Iconians. You seek to destroy the Other, whom you call Pinkerton." T'ket waved her arm, destroying a small train car.

"I have the power you seek."

* * *

 **USS Ra Cailum**

* * *

Sonja blinked as she saw the readings on the scanners.

Familiar readings. "Oh, hell." She tapped her commbadge. "Bossman, we got a serious problem here."

" _Define 'serious problem'._ "

"We're picking up subspace anomalies near the area of Mountain Glenn. The Iconian Bitch has showed up again."

Sonja prepared for the yell.

" _T'KET!_ " THERE it was. " _Get Team RWBY's weapons and mine beamed down here! I'm finishing this once and for all!_ "

"Understood, Bossman," Sonja replied. "It'll be down there ASAP."

* * *

The White Fang grunts were heavily armed for Remnant militia. No chance in hell against even 22nd Century United Earth Starfleet, but they were well-armed.

But against RON, it was futile as he just charged into the railway tunnel entrances. "So, how do you know where they are?"

"Subspace readings coupled with a map of the area pre-loss. The White Fang base is inside the rail network and so is that Iconian BITCH!"

"You really don't like this… T'ket, do you?"

"She took Larcei's childhood away from her. Now I'm going to relieve this Iconian bitch of her life!" He ran into the tunnels, surprising White Fang grunts before he either shot them or decapitated them.

"…He is _mad_ …" Ruby muttered.

"I certainly don't blame him," Blake remarked. "She showed up while they were in the universe Galactica came from and kidnapped a three-year-old Larcei, then a Gateway mishap sent Larcei to the world they visited next, but also back in time 18 years. And she was found by a group working as a resistance movement against an alien occupation, which wouldn't afford many opportunities for a regular childhood."

Yang deployed her two shot-gauntlets. "She dies."

"On THAT, you and our new commanding officer agree."

* * *

"What do you mean, we lost contact with the teams outside?! Find out what happened!" Crunching metal was heard before an I-beam was thrown into the railyard, killing two of Adam's men before impaling a third.

Emerald nervously chuckled at the sight. "Well. Can't say he's not the strongest man we've never met."

"T'KET!" The captain emerged from the hole he just made, one eye blue as a jewel, the other glowing a deep hateful red. "We END this today, you ICONIAN WHORE!"

Following behind him were four other people in similar uniforms, who Emerald recognized from the time spent in Beacon as Team RWBY.

"Oh, crap." She could probably fool Team RWBY with her semblance. But it was useless against machines: she tried it once, didn't work out well. Captain Pinkerton was 70% machine, including that eye of his.

"Emerald Sustrai and Mercury Black. I'll leave it up to you assholes to either die or put yourselves under arrest. Adam Taurus, you die, period. As for you, lady, same choice as the rest."

Cinder flared up, fire on her hands.

"She's the one that helped Torchwick at the robbery!" Ruby fully deployed Crescent Rose while Ron considered that.

"Forget my last statement: you die, too."

"We'll see about that," Cinder replied, making a gesture as fire erupted from the ground underneath Ron.

It… didn't do much. Of anything. At all.

"I WAS going to consider not killing you and simply charging you with aiding and abetting terrorists." He spun his kilij in his hands. "Now you ARE going to die because you tried to kill ME."

Cinder feared few things. All Salem-related.

Ronald Pinkerton just beat all of those.

"You have made an impressive assortment of allies, Other," came the voice of T'Ket as she hovered into view.

"Ok, you Iconian bitch, I'm going to fucking rip you apart. You could've just stayed behind on Iconia, rebuilt, protected your surviving people, but NO, you wanted me DEAD just because I saved your fucking people and you didn't FUCKING REMEMBER ENOUGH to keep me from killing your sister! You brought that war on yourselves, T'ket!"

"You took my arm, murdered my sister!"

"WE WERE AT WAR! You killed more people than I ever did or will! Compared to you, my hands are clean!"

"Be that as it may," T'ket growled, "your allies will not save you, for you are not the only one to have acquired forces from across the multiverse." She gestured, and Gateways opened.

LOTS of Gateways.

All over and around the planet.

From which proceeded to emerge Elachi, Heralds, Cylon Centurions, Ethereal thralls, and even Locust.

"Uh-oh."

"Deal with the White Fang; I'll handle the Iconian assholes!" Ron opened fire with his compression rifle at the Heralds and Elachi, scoring headshots on all the organic targets once their shields were downed. Contrary to popular belief, PSGs were not easy to down, even the standard issue ones. It took Ron over nine months to make his compression rifle powerful enough to pen the shields of an Elachi Beta in three shots. Starfleet gleefully took these weapon specs and made similar mods to every phaser rifle in existence during the Iconian War.

The team nodded, going to work on the White Fang grunts as they charged, using a combination of phaser blasts from their rifles and attacks from their original weapons to steamroll over the White Fang grunts.

While their weapons were on stun, Ron's weren't, though he had to actually deploy cover shields and use grenades to take down several Centurions and Elachi. While Ron was a living tank, he wasn't invincible and he knew it. Against less advanced races like the Ethereals and the Locust, he was like a god. Against the Elachi and the Iconians, he was just another grunt.

But this grunt was not so easily killed. He threw up cover shield after shield, keeping the more lethal Iconian-led forces at bay.

But this wasn't the only front that was being fought.

* * *

Takeshi opened fire with his Lancer, shredding the torso of a Centurion before turning around and burying the chainsaw in the chest of a Muton that tried sneaking up behind him. His eyes glowed as he dominated an Elachi Beta and turned it against his fellows, before he fired the Lancer again and shredded a Grub.

On the rooftop, Luna had her SRS-99 out and was nailing headshot after headshot, thinning the enemy numbers for the other teams as they fought around the city while a MACO team provided close-in cover for her - she was much better in close these days than she had been in the past, but with the numbers they were facing she had decided it would be best for her to stick with what she did best: providing long range sniper support.

She ejected a magazine, slapping another one in as quickly as she could, putting another 14.5mm round into some dumb bastard's head before sighting in on a grinder, taking his head off.

Berserkers, locust and muton, rushed through the streets of Vale, the former taking high-density phaser fire to kill while the few Remnant personnel that weren't escorting the civilians killed the mutons after being given UNSC-issue weapons. " _Ra Cailum_ , there's a fucking shitstorm down here! We've got Locust, Ethereal thralls, Centurions, Elachi, and Heralds! Any Iconian ships in orbit?!"

" _We're picking them up on long range sensors, Take, and they're pissed: coming in at full impulse. It'll take them 15 minutes to reach Remnant orbit._ "

"Dammit…" Takeshi growled even as he chainsawed a muton Berserker. "We can't hold this… Yamato to Pinkerton! Ron, we're going to need to expand and accelerate the evacuations - save as many people as we can from T'ket's wrath!"

" _Open up the cargo transporters on the_ Ra Cailum _: get everyone we can on board! We'll worry about comfort later! Damn it, you fiery bitch, stand still!_ "

"What the hell are you doing?!"

" _Fighting a bitch named Cinder Fall! At least, that's what her Haven transcript calls her! She's fucking nimble, I'll give her that, but unlike me, she'll tire!_ "

Takeshi shook his head. Ron's ability to keep going when everyone else was exhausted came from _before_ his assimilation. Klingons, Vulcans, Gorn: he could outfight and outlast them. But why? He was _human_. It was a question Takeshi and the rest of the Federation had tried to answer for a long time.

"Understood," he called out. " _Ra Cailum_ , did you get Ron's instructions?"

" _We got them: relaying command to all transporter sites. As soon as they're done beaming everyone up, the units beam up, too. We're not leaving anything behind. And if possible, anyone._ "

They knew better. People were already dying on the ground. Still, the attempt had to be made. Another Berserker ran at Takeshi, who opened fire with his Lancer, actually making consistent headshots.

"Holy shit." He looked at his gun in shock. He landed no fewer than 9 headshots with an automatic weapon. He didn't know if that was an actual fluke or if he was just getting better at aiming, but he'd figure it out later.

Right now, they had to hold the motherfrakking line.

Mortar fire rained down from above, killing dozens of assholes. Then dust rounds began coming at them. "Fuck! Ron?!"

" _T'ket's aiding the White Fang! They've got a goddamn train loaded with explosives at Mountain Glenn and we've got Grimm out the ass following it! We'll be in Vale in 10 minutes, 3 seconds, mark_!"

"Oh shit!" Takeshi shouted, before tapping his commbadge "Jaden! You reading me?"

" _Reading you, Take, what's up?_ "

"There is a train full of explosives heading towards Vale, with a shitton of Grimm behind it, and T'Ket is back and bringing an army of Iconian minions, Cylons, Ethereals and Locust!"

There was a long pause on the comms. " _…you leave… for FIVE MINUTES. AND SHIT HAS **ALREADY HIT THE FUCKING FAN?!**_ "

"Don't blame me for this! T'ket's rampage doesn't make any goddamn sense! She was bloodthirsty before, but this makes no sense!" Clanking was heard as another Cylon approached, talons extended. Takeshi lit up his chainsaw, making contact with the swinging hand right before cleaving it off, followed by a swing to the head, taking the Cylon out.

More White Fang sleeper agents joined the Iconian forces in fighting Starfleet off, though compared to the Elachi and even the Cylons, they were pushovers.

" _T'ket must REALLY hate us if she's going this far to kill us, tou-san_!"

"Yeah…" Takeshi looked up to see Mir fighters coming out of gateways. "I'm starting to get that feeling."

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: Oh, hate doesn't even begin to describe it…**

 **Ron the True Fan: Or why. Bitch seems to just be obsessed with killing the Ra Cailum's crew and anyone linked with them.**

 **117Jorn: She's got a one-track mind, true enough. But what will become of Remnant? Find out next time in STAR TREK ODYSSEY!**


	40. Chapter 40

**Vale, Remnant**

* * *

The skies above Vale were littered with craft as Mir fighters and updated Cylon Raiders dueled with Colonial Vipers and Starfleet fighters as well - becoming an all-out free for all.

" _Commander Yamato, what in the hell is going on?! We thought you came in peace and now we have a war going on_!"

Takeshi fired his Lancer at another thin man, making it explode in a cloud of poisonous vapor. "Trust me, Councilors, we DID come here peacefully, but we have someone who's got one hell of a grudge after us! We thought we lost her last time!"

" _Clearly not! How do you intend to deal with this… Iconian_?"

There was only one option. They weren't going to like it. But they had no choice.

"The only thing we can do now… is evacuate," he said. "And I mean everyone we can - I don't know what she's going to do to anyone we leave behind just by dint of association with us."

Pulse cannon fire hit a Mir heavy fighter, sending it down in flames, crashing into a nearby building.

" _—expect us to just drop everything and leave?! Remnant is our home!_ "

"I wouldn't be saying this if I liked it, Councilors!"

Another explosion rocked the ground, the source being under their feet.

" _Pinkerton to all units: train has breached Vale's defenses! Grimm are two minutes behind us! Fucking hell, bitch, DIE ALREADY!_ "

Takeshi swore. "Dammit, things are getting worse… Councilors! We need to get started NOW! There's no other option here! We have to save as many people as we can!"

" _…Begin evacuations. Get everyone onto your ships. I expect Captain Pinkerton to answer for this, Commander!_ "

"Oh, he'll talk to you. But you won't like his answers."

* * *

Adam Taurus did not like Captain Pinkerton. He was a sanctimonious human whose ideals were fucking pointless. There was no equality through peace.

That said, he also just. Wouldn't. DIE! Every time someone tried to take a shot at him, he'd dodge out of the way or throw up one of those shields of his! It was frustrating!

Blake and her so-called team kept the rest of the White Fang busy while he and Cinder attempted to kill him.

Not easy, as he was blade-proof, fireproof, bulletproof and FUCKING INSANE!

"Come on, kids, I can do this all day!"

"Adam, would you kindly stop screwing around and STAB THIS SON OF A BITCH IN THE FACE?!"

Adam growled as he prepared Wilt for his Moonslice semblance - it was his strongest attack, capable of slicing through Aura easily. If this couldn't kill him, nothing would.

Ron drew his kilij, flipping the blade to use it as a more defensive weapon. Adam slashed at him, unleashing the full fury of his semblance. He thought he felt Ron's body give way. Instead, he saw his sword shatter as Ron's forearm, fully shielded, impacted the blade.

"Gotcha, bitch!" The left arm extended, tubules leaving Ron's knuckles and impacting Adam's skin before Ron flipped the sword in his hand around and impaled the Faunus, kicking him out of the tunnel and into Vale proper. The blade's flat kept him from being hacked in half either way.

"Captain… you can't assimilate me. It would take days for someone with an active aura!"

"Who said shit about assimilating you?"

At that point, Adam could feel himself weakening, somehow, almost as if his body was suddenly much older.

"Whoops. Didn't think Borg technology could do THAT, did ya, ass-fer-brains?"

His hair began to grow, the mask falling off his face. "Blake… Blake! Save… me! I know you have Borg technology in you! HELP ME!"

"Why should I?! You're nothing more than a mass murderer! You kill people just for BEING THERE!"

Adam just let out one final cry of rage and agony as his skin continued to wrinkle and die… before all that was left of the man was dust, and his mask.

Ron turned to Cinder. "And then there was one," he said.

Cinder's eyes widened before she fled like the bitch that she was. "That was simple."

"So you believe, Other."

Ron groaned before looking at T'ket, escorted by two of her harbingers. "Why won't you just fucking GO AWAY?"

"Not until I claim my vengeance," she announced, as her harbingers began attacking him.

They fired at him, forcing him to make leaps and use his infamous jetpack to dodge their fire. "Blake, Number 57, now!"

The faunus threw a grenade at T'ket, who caught it before it exploded, destabilizing her energy field. "What?!"

"We've had three years to study how you work, T'ket! Get ready to die!"Hori

Team RWBY came in at this point, Yang leading by leaping over Ron from behind to unleash a blast from Ember Celica, knocking T'ket back before Blake unleashed a few rounds. Weiss was next, pelting her with ice from her glyphs, before finally Ruby came in at high speed and delivering a devastating slash from Crescent Rose while T'ket was off balance.

"My power!"

"Time to die, bitch!" Ron drew his sword, heading straight for T'ket.

* * *

Takeshi had beamed back to the ra Cailum to take command of the fleet, as much as he could. "Report!"

"Iconian ships are closing in: 150000 kilometers from weapons range. We're screwed."

"Not yet," Takeshi replied. "We can hopefully hold them at bay long enough to get out of here. Cassie, what's the status of the evacuation?"

"We're at 30% for Remnant's population. Takeshi, we're still beaming Faunus up from the surface. We're not going to be able to get them all out of there in time."

"Open up transporters all over the ship and divert power from the weapons and shields! We've got to get our people out of there!"

Takeshi was not ready for this. He was an escort captain: his jobs were short and simple, restricted to killing enemy ships and making the enemy's life hell. Evacuations? Relief operations?

This was beyond him. He could barely handle commanding the Ra Cailum when Ron was undergoing maintenance.

"Do we have transporters up on any of the colony ships?" he asked.

"40% of them are online."

"Sonja—"

"I know, I know, get them online. I'll beam over to the _Andrea Doria_ and get their transporters online. The other ships will take time—"

"Get it done fast!"

Sonja waved it off, heading for the aft transporter platform.

Takeshi hit the comm button on the command chair. "Matt, I need you over on the _Andrea Doria_. Help Sonja get the transporters online. We need to increase the rate at which we can evacuate the planet!"

" _On it, sir! Should I get Mitod on the_ Britannic _and the_ Magellan?"

"We need every engineer working on those transporters! Drain our crew dry if you have to, but I want Remnant's population off that planet!"

" _Got it!_ " Matt replied, before the channel closed.

Takeshi sighed. "Get crews down to the shuttles," he said. "We can add to our transport capacity with their transporters - not much, but every little bit helps."

* * *

" _This is a Class-1 Alert. All civilians, please proceed to evacuation points. Transporter pads one through five are filled to capacity. Transporter pads six through ten are filled to capacity. Transporter pads eleven and twelve are free and clear. Please proceed through evacuation route four_."

Roman Torchwick groaned. The Starfleet VI was such a pain in the ass to listen to. Still, he kept his annoyance down as much as he could - he knew his only ticket off this now apparently doomed rock was remaining as inconspicuous as possible alongside Neo. The only unknown variable in the plan was whether Neo's illusions could be maintained through the transporter beam, but Neo had spent hours practicing throwing that particular illusion up as quickly as possible, so hopefully that would be enough.

He might have let Cinder know about this option… if he cared, really. Which he didn't - all he cared about was himself and Neo, and he would lie, cheat, steal, whatever to allow the two of them to survive and thrive, no matter where they were or would end up.

(BGM: Mass Effect 3 Sur'kesh combat)

"BERSERKER!" A screech signalled the arrival of a Locust monster, screaming and running at the refugees. One of the Starfleet soldiers-a MACO, he believed they were called-fired several phaser shots at the locust female, allowing a Gear to fire a Oneshot round into its' head, killing it.

"Come on, people! Let's move! We'll have to beam you straight onto the Ra Cailum; we'll worry about getting you to the colony ships later!"

Roman and Neo just stuck together as they made their way with the crowd, slowly moving towards the transporter platforms.

Bullets flew over their heads as Locust drones approached the column. "Come on, people!" One MACO fired up his Lancer's chainsaw, meeting the Locust in combat, dueling one with his chainsaw.

One of the buildings collapsed, and Roman was introduced to Captain Ronald Pinkerton. Or at least his body.

"Captain!"

Ron got up, sword in hand. "Get these people to the transporters!" He looked at Roman and Neo briefly, narrowing his eyes and making the right one glow slightly.

He knew. He KNEW!

But before the two could react, he leapt back into the fight with the Iconian.

Roman sighed. Whether the Captain didn't care or whatever, he wasn't going to look this gift horse in the mouth, and ushered Neo towards the waiting transporters.

A group of 20 disappeared in those showers of light, and five seconds later, another group followed. "How's it going?"

"Transporter buffer's overheating up in orbit! We need to hold the line for at least five minutes so they can cool off!"

"I thought those things needed hours!"

"Commander Henderson found a way to vent the heat into space; anyone here good with a weapon?! We can't beam anyone up for at least five minutes, so we need to hold the bastards off!"

Roman and Neo looked at each other, and nodded. "We can do it," he said. "We're not Huntress or Huntsman material, but the two of us have used our decent share of weapons for self defense." The fact that said weapons were a cane cannon and a multipurpose umbrella wasn't really relevant at this point.

Two phaser carbines were shoved into their arms, as were others. "Take cover!" Bullets flew in their direction as metal cover shields raised, giving them more protection. Two boomers and a trio of Usra roared as they charged, the MACOs firing their weapons at the enemy. "Keep these bastards away from the civilians! Mictorp-launchers authorized!"

Roman ducked behind cover, Neo right beside him, as the pair peeked around the cover and unloaded phaser bursts into the approaching foes, aiming to take down the massive Ursa.

One pulled out what looked like a goddamn rocket launcher. "Firing!" A projectile left the weapon, impacting the Grimm and… well, vaporizing it. And everything within ten meters of it.

" _This is Mobius Squadron: we're RTB for the_ Ra Cailum _; we can put our transporters to better use up there!_ "

"Understood!" came the reply from the MACO in charge. "We'll hold as long as we can!"

" _This is Gorgon Squad: we got fuckin' Heralds out the ass!_ Ra Cailum _, painting targets!_ "

" _Negative, Gorgon: weapons are offline. You'll have to do this the old fashioned way._ "

A gateway then opened up before the group, a massive Herald emerging. "Fuck me, we got a Defiler down here! Correction, five of them! Ra Cailum, we need air support!"

Roman realized that holding back wasn't really going to help here, so he shifted his carbine to a one-handed grip, and lifted Melodic Cudgel with the other, the sight popping up as he fired the carbine to keep them busy, before lining up his cane and firing off a round.

The MACOs didn't care; they opened fire on the Herald before a Peregrine swooped in and fired its' phaser cannons at the Heralds.

" _Orion Squad, this is Mobius One: that was on the house. We're RTB._ "

"Copy that, sir!"

" _This is Commander Yamato: all units, transporters are online. Get those people up here!_ "

Roman and Neo kept hold of their carbines, but otherwise cycled back into the line of refugees making their way to the transporters.

Their group soon came up, and they were beamed onto the superdreadnought, their weapons missing. "Your belongings will be returned to you when you depart; clear the pad!"

Roman and Neo got off the pad, smirking. They won. They were on board the Ra Cailum.

Now they just needed to survive.

* * *

Blake fired her pulse rifle at the Iconian bitch before she shoved her weapon into T'ket's hand, hacking off the equivalent ring and pinky fingers. "That's for Larcei, you fucking bitch!"

T'ket fell back, and roared in anger. Once again, the Other and his allies were defeating her!

"You will not defeat me!"

T'ket's left eye exploded with pain as Ruby put a dust round into her head. "Says you!"

T'ket opened up a solar gateway, but Ruby dodged, making T'ket roar in pain and rage.

Right before Yang shoved her fist into T'ket's stump, removing it.

T'ket roared again, as she tried to launch a lance of energy at Yang, who dodged.

This was going to be a long fight.

* * *

The Ra Cailum rocked from an impact from T'ket's dreadnought. Thankfully, Takeshi wasn't an idiot and ordered the ablative generators activated, an armored shell covering the Oddy. "Report!"

"Armor at 93%, transporters are close to frying!"

"What about the evacuation?!"

"We've lost over eighty thousand people. The rest are either MIA or on board the colony ships."

"Dammit…" Takeshi sighed. "Too many… far too many…"

"I take it this is, and yet is not, an ordinary foe for you."

Takeshi turned at the new voice. "Headmaster Ozpin." He greeted. "And yes, you would be right. We finished up a war with the Iconians a few months before we began this journey… but T'ket, for some reason, still holds a grudge against us."

"Commander, I know I'm asking much. But… there is an enemy down there. Far more dangerous than you expect. If she allies with T'ket, we—"

"Get to the point, Ozpin!"

"I want you to glass Remnant. Destroy everything. Leave nothing for T'ket to recover.'

Takeshi stared. "General Order 24," he stated. "You want me to use General Order 24."

Ozpin nodded, having read up on the General Orders.

Takeshi sighed. "Only the starship's actual captain can make that call - I need to contact Ron." He tapped the comm on his chair. "Yamato to Pinkerton. Ron, come in."

" _A bit fucking busy, Take! T'ket's trying pretty fucking hard to kill me personally!_ "

"I need GO24 authorization, Ron."

* * *

Ron put up a cover shield, which tanked an AP beam from the Iconian bitch. "WHAT?!"

" _Ozpin wants us to glass the planet - he wants to keep T'ket from allying with 'an enemy far more dangerous than we expect'. I need Captain's authorization before I can implement that._ "

Weiss shoved her blade into T'ket's chest, ice and gravity dust pummelling the bitch before T'ket looked at him. "You failed to protect the Preservers, you failed to save your fleet at Iconia—"

"The only fucking thing I failed to do was FUCKING KILL YOU!" Weiss looked back at him, eyes widening as he charged, Kilij pointed at T'ket's chest before she jumped off, Ron shoving the blade through the Iconian's chest. "I want you to fucking beg. PLEAD!"

However, she didn't beg. She plunged her hand through Ron's chest.

Ron didn't notice until he felt his stomach lurch, his artificial organs scream. The blood leak out of his mouth.

"All those centuries of waiting… My desire for revenge is sated against you, Other!"

As another grand glorious bastard would put it...

Rage is a hell of an anesthetic. He wrapped his hands around T'ket's throat, squeezing, working his PSG to drain T'ket's energy, her 'life force', dry.

She was 50% energy: without that, her physical form would simply shut down. "Revenge… THIS, you fucking ICONIAN WHORE!"

"Why… why won't you die… Other?!" T'ket demanded, even as she felt herself grow weaker.

Yang punched T'ket in the face, Ron's iron grip shattering like glass as her arm left his gut.

" _Ron?! Ron?! Goddamn it, brother-in-law, ANSWER ME! RON!_ "

"This is Cadet Belladonna: the Captain has been massively wounded by T'ket! We need emergency beam out!"

" _Dammit! Transporters, get them out of there - beam Ron directly to Sickbay! Then get all our other teams still on the ground aboard!_ "

* * *

Takeshi sighed heavily as he sank into the command chair. "With… with Captain Pinkerton out of commission, I am now taking command of the ship," he said. "And… under that authority…" he glanced over at Ozpin. "I am authorizing General Order 24.

"Shields up! Armor generators deactivating!" The armored shell that covered the Ra Cailum faded away, replaced by her deflector shields.

"Weapons safeties unlocked. Targeting scanners set to maximum range of destruction, Captain. Ready to fire on your order."

Takeshi choked at the title. While captain was the title of the master of any ship, Ron always said that if you're not at the rank of captain, you're not a captain; you're a commander that just so happens to command a starship.

He couldn't command this ship. He couldn't take Ron's command.

…He couldn't lead them home. He was a leader, yes, but a leader of _thousands_? A _general_? If compared to the Roman army, Takeshi was a Centurion: a leader of a hundred men, ready to charge into battle. Ron was a _Legatus legionis_ : Takeshi remembered Ron's impromptu history class on Roman army ranks and tactics during Takeshi's first class with him, remembering him translating it as 'basically General', who were leaders of the Empire's armies, equal in Starfleet's terms as Admirals and colony governors. Ron was one of them. He just refused the state of leadership to serve with his crew.

"Don't call me 'Captain', he said. "As far as I'm concerned, I'm just keeping Ron's chair warm." He then looked at the viewscreen, and the planet below. "Open fire."

The Ra Cailum's weapons lanced at the surface, phasers impacting the ground.

Takeshi steeled himself. He had to be strong. Ron wouldn't flinch.

He wasn't Ron.

* * *

"MOVE, GODDAMN IT!" Blake and Yang carried their new commanding officer through the crowded halls, Ruby and Weiss shoving people out of the way.

Ron chuckled in their arms. "Mother? I thought you were still on the _Damascus…_ "

Blake blinked. Was Ron beginning to hallucinate or something?

"Oh… you just got back… I'm going to Starfleet Academy next week…"

"The hell is with him?"

Blake had an idea. "His positronic brain is probably sending signals to make him remember his life to block out the pain!"

Yang's face twisted in confusion. "I thought he didn't feel pain."

"He's still human and he had a _hand_ shoved **_through his chest_** ; any of us would either be dead or screaming!"

Yang nodded. "Good point. We need to move, then!"

They arrived in sickbay, where walking wounded were being treated. Rutia barely paid attention to them as she looked at her nurses. "Ok, get dermal regenerators—HOLY FUCK WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK FUCKING HAPPENED TO HIM?!"

"He got impaled by T'ket!"

Rutia only stared for a second, then started belting out orders.

"Walker, get me type-O blood, NOW! I need tissue regenerators and bone knitters, and someone get an engineer in here to get his fucking cybernetics fixed!"

Blake laid him on the biobed, grabbing tools.

"The fuck are you doing?"

"I've got all of his technical knowledge: I can repair his cybernetics."

"Alright, we'll be relying on you." Blake didn't need reminding: Takeshi wasn't the leader this fleet needed. Adama couldn't take command of the other ships. Hoffman and Fenix had little authority. Drake was more interested in protecting his people and getting them to the other universe.

As much as the captain would hate to have it said, he was their last, best, and only hope to get home. She would not fail.

* * *

The superdreadnought rocked from another transphasic torpedo hitting the shields. "That's getting annoying. Warp drive?!"

"Not ready, sir! We need to lower our shields to extend the warp field!"

"Dammit! How about the Jump Drive? Can we get clear that way before going to warp?"

"We'll need to spin up the drives first, and cold that'll—"

"Take 20 minutes, which we don't have. FUCK!" Takeshi preferred the Colonial method of cursing, but the old fashioned one was better suited to this situation.

"Commander, three Cylon baseships are breaking formation, nuclear weapons armed."

"What, are they trying to finish us off?" Takeshi asked, before he saw the baseships in question open fire… at the Iconian Fleet. "OK, what the frak?"

"Sir, incoming hail from the lead baseship."

"Patch it through!"

The voice of a Six came through, clear as day. " _Captain Pinkerton, this is Natalie Faust, commander of the lead baseship. We've gotten tired of following T'ket and Cavil. Request permission to join the fleet._ "

"This is Commander Takeshi Yamato. Ron's out of commission for the moment, but I have to say, thank you, and welcome aboard."

"The baseships have caused chaos in the enemy lines, sir!" Takeshi looked at the tactical display attached to the center chair. The fleet was scattering, all of them turning towards the rogue baseships. "Baseships are spooling up."

"They'll jump into the middle of our formation. As soon as that happens, bring the wormhole drive online." Takeshi gulped, trying to trust his instincts and his crew.

Hard to do when you're not their real leader.

The baseships jumped into the formation.

"Riza, now! Wormhole Drive, let's get out of here!"

In their confusion, the Iconians could not stop them as the fleet jumped into the wormhole created seconds after they jumped to warp.

T'ket was going to be PISSED.

* * *

 **"Star Trek" Timeline**

 **Earth Orbit**

* * *

The shuttlecraft _Schwertkreuz_ made its way out of Earth Spacedock. A Type-10 shuttle, it was the personal ride of Admiral Hayate Yagami, and was ferrying both herself and Captain Ayame Pinkerton from a briefing in Earth Spacedock to the assembling 'backup fleet' for the Ra Cailum.

Neither officer were very confident in assembling a fleet: the flagship commanders-Jarok, Shon and Koren-were the only definite officers willing to join their little task force. While Ron had good will with just about every government due to his 'take-no-bullshit, get the job done' attitude, which won them the war… A _lot_ of people hated him.

He pissed off the Devore Imperium, the Kazon-Nistrim wanted his head and while he was The Other to the Iconians, T'ket had disappeared.

They would be more then happy to see him never come back.

"So…" Hayate mused. "Five ships at best guess… well, six, considering the one we're bringing along for Commander Yamato. Not exactly the largest fleet ever, we just have to hope it'll be enough…"

"MIGHT have to revise that…" Ayame pointed at a B'rel that flew over their shuttle, joining a massive Klingon force. "Uh… That's a lot of BoPs. And Vor'chas, Negh'vars… is that the goddamn Ty'gokor?" More Klingon ships decloaked, revealing a massive armada, including a pair of Vo'Quv-Class dreadnought carriers.

"O… kay…" Hayate remarked. "Well, seems the Klingons are wanting Ron back pretty badly…" She then spotted something that she never thought she'd see in orbit of Earth except in worst-case scenarios. "Is… is that a fleet of ships from the Cooperative?"

Borg spheres and cubes entered formation with the Klingons, all sporting the light blue colors of the Cooperative. "Yeah, those are Cooperative—" A shimmer of light signalled the mass decloaking of a large Romulan warbird, D'Deridex-Class off their port side. It wasn't alone as a number of Norexan-Class warbirds decloaked, as well as a massive number of T'varo-type warbirds. "The fuck?"

"Holy cow," Hayate remarked. "OK, that's Klingons, Romulans, and the Borg Cooperative… what next?"

The uneven form of a Chel Grett-Class cruiser dropped out of the transwarp gate, along with a number of other warships, including a carrier and a dreadnought. "You're fucking kidding me." They entered formation with the Klingons, Romulans and borg, themselves joined by a Kobali Samsar-Class battleship and a Benthan guard cruiser. Kazon ships then exited the gate. "Fuck me with a 40-foot pole!"

"Breen, Kobali, Benthan, and Kazon," Hayate breathed. "Wow… that's… a lot…"

" _Shuttlecraft_ Schwertkreuz _, this is USS_ Hornet: _get the hell out of the way_." The _Akira_ -Class escort carrier shot past, its' _Peregrines_ shooting past the shuttle, some getting pretty damn close as more Starfleet ships shot past, including a surprise.

"…Is that the _Empress of Japan_?"

"It is." The _Empress of Japan_ was one of six _Jupiter_ -Class carriers, all built at the same time. And they **_always _** operated together.

"Wow," Hayate said, before noticing another group. "The _Avalon_ and its group are here, too!"

The _Avalon_ was another _Jupiter_ -class Carrier, core of another battle group, but its claim to fame was that it was the flagship of Admiral Lelouch Lamperouge, and home to his personal fighter squadron, the 'Black Knights'.

The USS _Chinook_ and _Dakoda, Excelsior_ -Class sisters, flew past, joining a large number of Miranda-Class starships.

"Uh… What the hell?"

This made no sense. How in the hell did one man get this popular?

A _Devron_ decloaked, the sensor pylons near the bridge nearly clipping the Type-10 shuttle as she flew past. "Watch where you're going!" Hayate then saw what could only be called a Jem'hadar's worst nightmare approach the fleet: no fewer than 20 _Defiant_ -Class and type starships. Some were the limited production _Sao Paulo_ -class, but most of them were _Defiants_. "Wow… this is…"

"MADNESS." Ayame took the helm, getting them to her ship.

"What are you doing?"

"Look, my ship's better suited for command and control. It's what the _Galaxy_ -Class was DESIGNED for in times of war, remember?" The admiral nodded, remembering clearly. While powerful, the _Galaxy's_ REAL role in war was to serve as a command ship, coordinating commands for at least five sectors. The _Enterprise_ -D served the same role during Jellico's brief and nigh-disastrous command.

So Ayame was just using her ship because it was better suited as a comm nexus for the fleet.

The _Examia_ had its own advantages, being from the 31st century with several different fancy technologies (most of which Hayate kept secret except in cases of dire emergencies), but she did admit that the _Damascus_ was better as a command ship.

They were rushed into the bay, Ayame leading them through the hangar as soon as the shuttle was down, getting them through the halls. Hayate noted that only a few of the officers were new: the rest looked 30, even 40. "Your crew's almost all-original."

"Perks of loyalty. They like working under my command, so they don't want to leave." They arrived on the bridge moments later. Unlike every other _Galaxy_ in the fleet, it looked almost like the D's from launch: the storage lockers were still here, no additional consoles…

"Yes, the module's the same one. Minor upgrades kept it useful. Open a channel to the _Bortasqu', Enterprise,_ and _Lleiset_."

"Channel open," the comm officer replied, before the images of Shon, Koren, and Jarok appeared split-screen.

"What the hell is going on?"

" _Why, hello to you too, Captain Pinkerton the Elder._ "

"Don't be cute, Shon. What the hell is going on here? We didn't expect… HOW many ships are out there?"

" _About 400 right now, but we got more coming in. There's a few Vaadwaur ships that are on the way_."

Hayate's brow twitched. 400? "And… _all_ the crews on those ships want Ron back?" she asked.

" _The Klingon empire owes him a debt of honor! When he challenged the Chancellor on Qo'nos for an insult to the Federation, he proved that he had a spine of neutronium! His actions saved many warriors from a premature departure to Sto'vo'kor during the war, and for that, we want him returned._ "

" _The Romulan Republic owes him dearly, Admiral: his actions against the Elachi and the Iconians saved my world three times over. Not to mention his role in the destruction of the Empire. The_ Lleiset _stands ready._ "

Hayate nodded slowly. "All… alright…" she said. "And… and the other groups…?"

" _The Breen like him: he was honest about kicking their frosty rear ends and when Thel died, he actually cleaned up a few of their problems. The Kazon-Ogla and Plomar owe him for killing Sessen. The Bethans gained more influence in Devore space, the Cooperative sees him as their ideal, the Vaadwaur owe him_ , period—"

"What about Starfleet?"

" _Come on, he was on the front lines. Every single one of these ships was saved by his actions. The_ Empresses, _the_ Avalon… _all of them. Even_ your _ship_."

Hayate reluctantly nodded. There had been a few times when Ron had provided the distraction that allowed Spec Ops Section 6 to complete its mission, even without the fancy tech the _Examia_ carried. "Alright," she said. "So, Ron was a bit more popular than I thought… we might have a chance here, after all."

" _Knowing him, he's making friends wherever he is._ "

" _Songs will be sung of this journey, Admiral. Qa'pla!_ "

" _Jolan tru, Admiral._ " The call ended.

"Never underestimate a Pinkerton. Ever."

"I'm getting that feeling."

* * *

 **Takeshi Yamato: And so another stage of the Odyssey comes to a close, even as the Backup Fleet begins forming up.**

 **Ruby: Did we HAVE to leave Remnant behind?**

 **Ron the True Fan: Yes, for the _last_ time. **

**Blake: I'm eager to see where we go next.**

 **117Jorn: Oh trust me, the next universe is one Ron's been wanting to do for a LOONG time.**

 **Yang: Which one?**

 **Weiss: I think he made me watch it. It's interesting. It's called (Beep) What the?**

 **Ron the True Fan: Nice work, Jorn. The readers have to WAIT, Weiss. And in case you're wondering, Team RWBY is staying in the author's notes. It's more fun that way.**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Also, Ron and I have a VERY special Side Story in the works for this thing. It won't be ready for a while, but it'll be fun. A hint: What is it that shows you your own reflection, but only lets you see what lies beyond once it is cracked?**

 **Ron the True Fan: Really? That riddle is pathetic.**

 **Ruby: I don't get it.**

 **Ron the True Fan: I suggest watching Star Trek: The Original Series. Season 2, Episode 4. THEN you'll get it.**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Further context is also provided from DS9 Season 2 Episode 23, DS9 Season 3 Episode 19, DS9 Season 4 Episode 20, DS9 Season 6 Episode 8, and DS9 Season 7 Episode 12. ENT Season 4 Episodes 18 and 19 aren't necessarily _NEEDED_ , but provide even more context.**

 **Ruby: So much TV to watch… Ron! I'm stealing your computer!**

 **Ron the True Fan: Like hell you [Connection lost]**

 **Yang: Oh, boy.**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Well, we should probably get Ron's computer back from Ruby. See you next chapter, hopefully!**

 **Ja ne!**


	41. URE Time!

**Important Author's Note**

* * *

 **Ron the True Fan: Well, this is fucking weird. Well, readers, hate to do this, but announcement time. We are discontinuing Star Trek Odyssey.**

 **Takeshi Yamato: Much as we hate to do it, we planned ourselves into a corner, and found ourselves making decisions we weren't really comfortable with. However, just because we ran into those problems, does not mean that Star Trek Odyssey itself is coming to an end. You probably know what's coming next.**

 **Ron the True Fan: Ultimate Rewrite Edition time! The beginning is the same, but everything changes. Completely redesigned timeline, new arcs, new everything.**

 **117Jorn: Some events and universes visited shall get flipped around, and we will have a whole plethora of new wacky things our cast will handle! So fret not, next week brings with it the prologue and first chapter to the URE of STO! So until then…**

 **Ja Ne!**


End file.
